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CHRISTIAN    FAITH   AND 
DOCTRINE    SERIES 

EDITED  BY  REV.   F.   B.   MEYER,   B.A. 


The  Inspiration  and  Authority  of  Holy 
Scripture.  By  Rev,  J.  Monro  Gibson,  M.A., 
LL.D. 

The  Doctrine  of  the  Last  Things.  By  Rev. 
J.  G.  Greenhough,  M,A. 

Conversion;  or,  The  New  Birth.  By  Rev. 
Newton  II.  Marshall,  M.A.,   Ph.D. 

The    Christian    Conception    of    God.      By 

Principal  W.  F.  Adeney,  M.A.,  D.D. 

The  Resurrection  and  the  Life.  By  Rev.  G. 
Hanson,  M.A.,  D.D. 

IN  PREPARATION. 


The  Person  of  Christ.    By  Rev.  R.  F.  Horton, 
M.A.,  D.D. 

The   Personality   and   Worlc   of    the    Holy 
Spirit.     By  Rev.  Charles  Brown,  D.D. 

Man  and  Sin.     By  Prof.  Peake,  M.A.,  D.D. 

Missions   (Home    and     Foreign)    and    the 
Church.     By  Dr.  Chas.  Wenyon. 

The  Church  and  the  Kingdom.     By  Rev.  J. 

iJCOTT   LlDGETT,    M.A.,    D.D. 


Cbrlstian  f  aitb  anD 
Doctrine  Scries 


I 

THE 

INSPIRATION    AND    AUTHORITY 

OF    HOLY    SCRIPTURE 


THE  INSPIRATION 
AND  AUTHORITY  OF 
HOLY     SCRIPTURE 


JOHN    MONRO    GIBSON,    M.A.,  LL.D. 


AUTHOR    OF  *'  THE    DEVOTIONAL    USE    OF    HOLY    SCKirTURB,"-' 

"  THE  UNITY  AND  SYMMETRY   OF  THE  BIBLE," 

"ST.  MATTHEW  IN  THE  EXPOSITOR'S  BIBLE,"  ETC; 


^.c»  ^'^''i^'%; 


\  •''■ 


WITH   AN   INTRODUCTION   BY 

PRINCIPAL    FORSYTH,    M.A.,  D.D. 


^^C  -0  1913 


New  York  Chicago  Toronto 

Fleming    H,    Revell    Company 

London       and       Edinburgh 


FLEMING  H.  KEVLLL  OUMFANV^ 


New  York:  158  Fifth  Avenue 
Chicago :  80  Wabash  Avenue 
Toronto:  25  Richmond  St.,  W. 
London:  21  Paternoster  Square 
Edinburgh  :   100  Princes  Street 


CONTENTS 


Introduction  by  Principal  Forsyth,  M.A.,  D.D. 
Personal  Foreword  by  Author    .... 

PART  I 
INTRODUCTORY 

CHAPTER 

I.    The  Inspiration  with  which  we  have 

TO  do 

II.    The  Field  to  be  Explored    . 
III.    The  Method  of  Exploration 

PART  II 

INSPIRATION    AND     AUTHORITY 
OF  THE  REVELATION 


Vll 

3 


IV.    A  Prophet  Nation     . 
God-consciousness    . 
The  Passion  for  Righteousness 
Lofty  Spirituality 
The  Nation's  Pulpit 
V.    Divine    Discipline    through 

History 
VI.    The  Object  Lesson    . 

VII.    The  Substance  of  Revelation 
The  Name  of  God 
The  Salvation  of  God     . 


Long 


13 
23 
32 


41 
46 
52 
57 
63 

68 
80 

89 

93 
96 


VI 

CONTENTS 

CHAPTER 

PAGB 

VIII. 

Verification  :  Authority 

AND  Vision 

103 

Authority — External  and 

Internal   . 

.        106 

Authority  in  Life  and  in 

Religion 

113 

Authority — Ultimate  and 

Proximate 

1x8 

IX. 

The  Way  of  Certainty 

•        < 

126 

PART   III 

INSPIRATION   AND    AUTHORITY 
OF  THE   RECORD 

X.    Introductory 143 

XI.    Necessary       Limitations  —  "  Earthen 
Vessels"     .... 
Human  Agency 
Human  Language    . 
Literary  Form 
XII.    The  Excellency  of  the  Power 
Power  of  the  Gospel 
Incidental  Excellencies    . 

XIII.  The  Place  of  Criticism    . 

As  Regards  the  Treasure 
As  Regards  the  Vessels  . 

XIV.  Gains  from  Reverent  Criticism 

An  Unassailable  Foundation  . 
A  Great  Cloud  of  Witnesses  . 
A  Fresh  Human  Interest 
All  Scripture  Profitable    . 
After- word 


146 
150 
153 

155 

160 
162 
169 

174 
176 
184 
191 
194 
202 
219 

239 
245 


INTRODUCTION 
By  Principal  Forsyth,  M.A.,  D.D. 


ONCE  there  was  a  dragon  almost  as 
large  as  the  world,  and  he  was  sur- 
rounded by  a  mighty  brood.  And  they  lay 
heavy  on  the  hearts  and  thoughts  of  men. 
But  slowly  the  heroes  of  the  world  mastered 
and  slew  them.  And  as  they  slew  them,  to 
make  sure  of  their  end  they  burnt  them, 
and  the  prodigious  dust  and  ashes  were  cast 
upon  the  sea.  There  they  settled  down  to 
the  bottom  in  a  dense  mass,  which  covered 
the  whole  ocean  floor.  And  there,  in  course, 
it  condensed  and  set ;  so  that  when  the 
ocean  retired,  in  the  great  convulsions  of 
the  world,  there  was  left  a  thick  layer  of 
flinty  rock  in  the  lowest  parts  of  the  earth. 
And  it  cost  the  inhabitants  almost  as  much 
labour  and  danger  to  blast  these  rocks  as 

vii 


viii  INTRODUCTION 

it  cost  their  forefathers  to  destroy  the 
dragon-brood.  But  destroyed  they  had  to 
be,  to  give  room  for  the  growing  life  and 
teeming  energy  of  the  new  race. 

Now  this  is  a  parable.  The  dragon-brood 
is  the  family  of  prodigious  old  error  which 
threatened  to  swallow  up  the  children  of 
light  and  truth.  And  the  heroes  are  the 
men  of  the  Spirit,  called  and  equipped  by 
God  to  encounter  the  error,  and  slay  it  with 
the  arrows  of  light.  And  so  they  break  it 
to  pieces,  and  bring  it  to  dust,  and  scatter 
it  to  wind  and  water.  But  from  being 
dangerous  in  one  form,  it  goes  on  to  be 
deadly  in  another.  And  it  settles  down 
on  the  lower  levels  to  be  the  densest  and 
most  impenetrable  stratum  of  all.  It  no 
longer  rages  with  tooth  and  claw,  but  it 
presents  the  tough  inertia  of  compacted 
ignorance,  prejudice,  use,  and  wont ;  and  it 
offers  to  progress  that  dense  passive  resist- 
ance which  is  so  much  harder  to  deal  with 
than  keen  active  revolt. 

It  is  one  of  the  depressing  things  in  social 
growth — the  persistence  and  recurrence  in 
lower  strata  of  old  fallacies  that  had  long 
been  disposed  of  in  the  region  of  the  higher 


INTRODUCTION  ix 

knowledge.  Just  as  there  are  said  to  be  in 
England  (or  were  till  recently)  spots  where 
the  conditions,  social  and  mental,  reproduced 
those  of  the  fifteenth  century ;  so  that  we 
h.^.d  the  middle  aofes  survivinof  in  the  base- 
ment  of  the  nineteenth  century ;  and  as 
there  are  certainly,  in  the  extreme  south 
of  Italy,  regions  where,  under  the  thinnest 
veneer  of  Catholicism,  there  still  subsists 
the  paganism  of  two  thousand  years  ago 
both  in  its  charm  and  its  superstition — so  it 
is  also  in  the  history  of  opinion.  We  have 
mental  strata  where  there  still  flourish  per- 
tinaciously and  securely  views  and  habits 
of  mind  which  have  long  gone  to  limbo 
in  quarters  where  wisdom  is  spoken  among 
the  full  grown.  Think  of  the  Greek  Church 
and  its  level  of  intelligence.  Think  of  the 
Roman  Church  in  Spain. 

Now  these  references  have  been  mainly 
stirred,  as  I  have  indicated,  by  the  obscur- 
antisms of  the  unreformed  churches.  The 
Reformation  brought  in  a  new  spirit.  But 
the  various  parts  of  Protestantism  move  at 
different  paces.  And  while  one  cannot  but 
respect  the  hesitation  and  caution  of  many 
who  still  cling  to  impossible  and  even  harm- 
ful views  of  Scripture,  one  has  still  more 


X  INTRODUCTION 

sympathy  with  those  who  try  to  mediate — 
not  between  views  but  between  the  learned 
and  the  public. 

II 

There  is  no  more  difficult  position  to-day, 
nor  one  which  evokes  less  sympathy,  than 
that  of  the  minister  who  has  to  stand  between 
the  world  of  modern  knowledge  on  the  one 
hand  and  the  world  of  traditional  religion  on 
the  other,  and  mediate  between  them.  It  is 
not  a  case  of  adjusting  his  own  faith  to  the 
new  knowledge.  He  has  done  that  and  can 
go  on  doing  it.  It  is  a  case  of  adjusting 
the  new  knowledge  to  the  untaught  faith  of 
others,  and  doing  it  in  the  way  of  reverence 
for  truth,  love  for  men,  and  regard  for  the 
growth  of  living  faith.  Any  vulgarian  can 
destroy  and  offend.  But  the  task  of  the 
veracious,  alert,  and  paternal-minded  man 
who  has  to  rear  faith  amid  a  world  of  com- 
motion, to  establish  the  soul  in  a  public  war 
of  elements,  and  to  secure  the  Eternal  in 
a  tempest  of  change,  is  very  delicate  and 
very  severe.  The  more  so  as  its  difficulty 
is  of  a  kind  that  does  not  readily  come  home 
to  most  people,  even  of  those  in  his  charge. 
The  plain  man,  whose  demand  for  a  plain 


INTRODUCTION  xi 

Yes  or  No  Christ  was  always  baffling,  has 
no  idea  what  it  costs  to  make  a  traditional 
creed  a  moral  reality,  and  to  turn,  as  our 
Lord  Jesus  had  to  do,  a  conventional  Messiah 
to  a  spiritual  Christ. 

And  what  the  Church  seems  to  require 
most,  at  the  moment,  is  less  an  army  of 
scholars  engaged  on  **  research  work  "  upon 
its  origins,  than  a  growing  body  of  men  at 
once  disciplined  to  scientific  sympathies  by 
a  proper  education  in  its  schools,  secured 
there  also  in  a  theology  of  experimental  faith, 
and  at  the  same  time  provided  with  the  art  of 
public  teaching,  and  endowed  with  the  sym- 
pathy and  tact  which  win  the  trust  of  the 
evangelical  public.  The  army  of  research  is 
sufficiently  well  recruited ;  also  its  van  has  been 
going  faster  than  the  main  body  can  follow, 
and  becoming  detached  from  its  evangelical 
base  both  in  sympathy  and  in  results.  What 
we  need  is  a  supply  of  capable  middle-men 
(if  the  term  may  be  allowed)  or  adjusters, 
who  know  the  new  truth,  the  old  faith,  and 
the  believing  people,  and  who  can  mediate 
the  inevitable  transition  without  fatal  acci- 
dent. The  premises  are  being  rebuilt,  but 
the  business  must  be  carried  on ;  and  the 
builders  must  be  competent  to  manage  both 


xii  INTRODUCTION 

without  loss  in  the  process,  and  with  great 
gain  in  the  end.  The  education  of  our 
ministers  must  keep  this  increasingly  in 
view.  The  unsettlement  among  them  pro- 
duced by  contact  with  the  crudest  of  "  ad- 
vanced" views,  is  a  severe  nemesis  upon 
the  neglect  by  the  Churches  of  the  colleges, 
or  the  neglect  by  the  colleges  to  provide 
a  theology  which  (like  the  study  of  medicine) 
makes  its  pupils  its  enthusiasts.  The  circum- 
stances of  the  time  make  this  a  requirement 
quite  as  essential  as  pulpit  fervour  or  pastoral 
skill.  But  the  Church  public  is  unconvinced. 
The  colleges  are  starved  both  of  funds, 
and,  still  more,  of  sympathy.  Students  are 
tempted  to  regard  the  colleges  as  the  Churches 
do,  and  not  take  them  seriously  compared  with 
pulpit  iclat  or  philanthropic  activity.  Which 
can  only  prepare  the  future  for  an  eclipse  of 
faith,  just  as  it  has  much  to  do,  from  the  past, 
with  faith's  occupation  at  present.  The  worst 
heresy  is  incompetency,  degenerating  into 
quackery.  It  cannot  be  too  clearly  under- 
stood that  no  amount  of  well-doing,  and  no 
amount  of  zeal,  and  no  amount  of  ethereal 
mysticism  will  save  the  situation  which  is 
being  forced  upon  us.  If  men  do  not  know 
what  to   believe   they  will   soon  not  know 


INTRODUCTION  ^     xiii 

what  to  do.     We  need  men  of  experimental 

historic  faith,  who  are  also  exercised  in  the 

knowledge   which   is   creating    the    present 

crisis.      Knowledge   will   not  do   it,  but   it 

canno^  be  done  without  knowledge.      And 

multitudes  of  our   teachers   and   preachers, 

truly  religious  men,  are  crying  out,  "  Would 

God   I  had   a  definite  creed   for  my  mind, 

and  a  positive  gospel  to  preach."     We  are 

in  a  social   position   growingly  complex,  to 

which  naive   religion   though   indispensable 

is  inadequate,  and  an  intelligent,  not  to  say 

scientific,  religion   is  required.      The   mere 

hierophants  only  gather  groups,  and  strike 

flashes ;     they    vary    between    pathos    and 

bathos ;    they  are   not   equal    to   the   needs 

of  a  great  Church  and  the  public  it  faces. 

And  only  two  courses  are  possible — either 

to  stand  on  every  statement  of  an  infallible 

book,  or  to  treat  extreme  rationalism  with 

a  higher  reasonableness,  meet  the  critics  on 

their  own  ground,  accept  results  tested  by 

their  own  methods  in  sounder  hands,  watch 

the  mere  philologist,  edit  the  reports  brought 

by    the    Uhlans    of    research,    distrust    all 

criticism    inspired    by    a    negative    dogma 

rather  than  by  historic  science,  and  proceed 

amidst  all   in  the  experienced   liberty  with 


xiv  INTRODUCTION 

which  Christ  crucified  has  set  our  conscience 
free  to  be  sure  and  bold  in  Him. 

Ill 

This  little  book  of  Dr.  Gibson's  appears 
to  me  to  be  an  admirable  example  of  his 
arduous  work  in  this  kind.  The  autobio- 
graphical interest  stirred  by  its  foreword  is 
great.  We  have  here  a  man  of  the  ripest 
pastoral  experience,  gathered  from  a  long 
life  which  yet  has  not  been  wholly  immersed 
in  pastoral  and  ecclesiastical  cares.  He 
began  in  the  old  theory  of  inspiration,  in 
which  he  would  have  remained  had  his  been 
a  metallic,  inert,  or  mechanical  mind.  But 
his  warm  and  capacious  personality,  his 
mental  interest  in  the  merits  of  the  case, 
his  reading  kept  up,  and  his  experience  in 
dealing  with  perplexed  souls,  have  combined 
to  urge  him  out  into  another  conception  of 
things,  in  which  he  finds  the  Bible's  true 
life,  power,  and  promise  for  the  future.  He 
says  he  does  not  profess  to  be  an  original 
scientific  mediator.  He  is  a  ductor  dubitan- 
Hum  and  not  a  dux  certaminis.  He  is  a 
servant  of  the  Church  rather  than  of  the 
schools.  His  book  is  a  flower  of  ministry 
rather   than  militancy.     It   is  calculated  (if 


INTRODUCTION  xv 

I  may  presume  to  say  all  this)  to  be  of  the 
greatest  use  to  multitudes,  especially  of 
young  people,  in  our  Churches,  who  are  not 
only  bewildered  in  their  faith,  but  in  great 
risk  of  losing  it.  It  will  do  very  much  to 
bring  home  to  such  the  saving  distinction 
of  the  Bible  and  the  Gospel,  even  while  it 
insists  on  their  inseparability.  It  is  true, 
lucid,  genial,  and  vivacious.  It  is  very 
honest  and  very  relevant  to  those  he  has 
in  view — a  really  educative  and  sympathetic 
book  for  all  such.  His  method  is  sound, 
and  his  principle  is  therefore  historic.  There 
is  a  flow  and  a  lift  in  the  book.  It  is  the 
work  of  a  man  who  knows  his  Bible  both 
from  without  and  within — as  the  scholarly 
minister  should — one  who  writes  with  his 
eye  on  the  object,  his  heart  in  his  theme, 
and  his  mind  alive  to  what  is  going  on  round 
him.  He  sees  (as  he  himself  desiderates) 
not  only  the  track  but  the  landscape.  He  is 
really  facing  the  situation,  and  not  butting 
at  it.  And  his  prime  object  is  not  to  be 
modern,  but  to  have  modern  sympathies — to 
have  the  modern  mind,  not  so  much  in  the 
way  of  starting  from  it,  but  of  duly  allowing 
for  it.  He  makes  a  valuable  protest  against 
the  vice  of  apriorism,  which  comes  down  on 


xvi  INTRODUCTION 

the  Bible  with  a  theory  of  inspiration  really 
drawn  from  rationalist  expectations,  instead 
of  rising  out  of  the  Bible  from  its  inductive 
treatment  as  faith  and  science  alike  must  do. 
He  shows  how  the  rationalism  of  orthodoxy 
has  its  congenial  nemesis  in  the  rationalism  of 
heresy.  He  begins  with  the  facts.  Let  the 
Bible  speak.  That  is  the  essential  principle 
of  criticism.  What  does  the  Bible  really  say  ? 
What  does  it  say  about  itself  ?  Very  little 
about  its  own  indubitable  inspiration,  as 
Christ  had  little  to  say  about  His  own  sin- 
lessness.  Let  us  get  at  the  facts,  and  then 
treat  each  fact  according  to  its  nature.  In 
a  fact  like  the  crucifixion  we  need  only 
beheve  ;  but  a  fact  like  Christ  crucified  we 
trust  for  ever  and  ever,  and  trust  it  with 
ourselves  and  our  destiny. 

I  venture  to  regard  Dr.  Gibson's  book 
as  a  real  service  to  the  Churches  he  has 
served  so  long.  It  is  a  ripe  fruit  of  that  long 
service.  And  it  is  a  worthy  help  to  the 
Church's  confidence  in  that  progressive 
theology  which  revolutionaries  are  throwing 
back  for  a  generation,  but  which  is  itself  a 
part  and  effect  of  the  vast  Redemption  in 
the  Saviour  who  gives  His  Church  its 
charter  and  its  life.     Criticism  exercised  by 


INTRODUCTION  xvii 

faith  is  one  thing  ;  criticism  inflicted  on  faith 
is  another.  The  one  is  an  essential  part 
of  the  Church's  reformation  by  the  Spirit; 
the  other  is  a  part  of  its  regulation  by  the 
world.  The  one  belongs  to  the  nature  of 
the  Free  Churches ;  the  other  is  a  subtle 
piece  of  Erastianism. 

IV 

I  should  like  to  add  a  word  of  sympathy, 
so  far  as  I  may,  with  the  whole  enterprise 
of  the  Free  Church  Council,  wherein  Dr. 
Gibson's  book  leads  the  way.  The  question 
of  belief  is  becoming  a  much  more  serious 
matter  for  the  Free  Churches  than  the 
question  of  their  public  work  or  social 
sympathies.  For  these  concern  their  rela- 
tion to  the  public,  while  their  faith  concerns 
their  existence.  And  it  is  unfortunate  that 
our  rank  and  file  should  be  left  to  pick  up 
stray  notions  about  the  great  subjects  from 
casual  sermons,  or  still  more  often  from  brief 
abstracts  of  sermons,  in  which  the  piquant 
phrases  are  culled  and  tied  up  in  small 
bunches,  while  the  essential  points  are 
missed,  and  the  argument  vanishes.  The 
more  the  cheap  press  touches  such  things, 
the  more   needful    it    is    that   fresh    effort 


xviii  INTRODUCTION 

should  be  made  by  those  responsible  for 
our  religious  stability  to  guide  serious  and 
intelligent  minds  in  a  duly  serious  way. 
There  were  never  so  many  in  all  the  history 
of  the  Church  crying  out,  *'  Where  am  I  ?  " 
as  there  are  to-day.  I  do  not  of  course  refer 
to  aggressives  and  destructives.  I  refer  to 
those  to  whom  it  is  a  pain  to  feel  their  feet 
slipping  from  them,  or  a  concern  to  think 
their  ground  is  undermined  ;  who  have  a 
real  though  bewildered  faith,  and  who  desire 
above  all  things  to  believe  if  they  could  see 
their  way.  To  many  such  this  enterprising 
series  of  books  should  be  of  great  use. 
They  are  written  by  men  who  know  how 
the  land  lies,  and  who  have  the  secret  of 
reaching  the  public  with  their  own  settled 
faith.  They  are  able  men  and  trusted.  The 
little  books  can  be  carried  where  larger 
works  will  not  go,  and  they  can  be  read  for 
their  excellent  style  by  those  to  whom  a 
scientific  terminology  would  be  jargon.  After 
a  certain  point,  of  course,  there  must  be 
scientific  terminology,  but  for  the  public  this 
series  has  in  view  it  is  not  only  useless  but 
irritant.  The  writers  may  be  trusted  to  see 
to  it  that  neither  the  science  nor  the  religion 
of  the  situation  suffer  in  their  hands. 

P.  T.  Forsyth. 


INSPIRATION    AND     AUTHORITY 

OF 

HOLY   SCRIPTURE 


PERSONAL  FOREWORD 

THE  task  of  contributing  to  the  discussion 
of  so  difficult  and  pressing  a  subject 
as  "The  Inspiration  and  Authority  of  Holy 
Scripture  "  is  one  which  I  should  not  have 
ventured  to  undertake,  had  it  not  been  laid 
upon  me  with  great  urgency,  not  only  by 
the  editor  of  this  series,  but  by  many  other 
friends  well  entitled  to  be  heard.  I  am 
only  too  keenly  conscious  of  my  inability  to 
deal  adequately  with  a  subject  so  momentous, 
with  the  limited  reading  on  it  which  has  been 
possible  to  one  so  full  of  engagements  as  I 
have  been  and  still  am.  This  disqualification 
would  have  been,  to  my  mind,  a  complete 
bar,  had  it  not  been  represented  to  me  that 
a  simple  presentation  of  the  subject  as  it 
appeared  to  my  own  mind  might  be  of  value 
to  many  who  would  not  be  likely  to  read 
or  profit  by  a  profound  and  exhaustive 
treatise.  I  confess  that  there  is  no  subject 
to   which    I    have   given   so    much    earnest 

3  B  2 


4  PERSONAL   FOREWORD 

thought  from  my  college  days  and  through- 
out the  whole  course  of  my  ministry.  I  was 
brought  up  to  believe  that  the  whole  fabric 
of  our  faith  rested  ultimately  on  the  founda- 
tion of  a  book  which,  though  written  by  many 
different  authors,  was  yet  from  beginning  to 
end  not  their  work  at  all,  but  that  of  God. 
They  were  simply  God's  penmen,  and  what 
they  wrote  was  at  His  dictation.  As  I  grew 
out  of  childhood  I  was  sorely  perplexed  by 
many  things  in  the  Bible  which  seemed 
wholly  at  variance  with  this  view,  and  I 
read  with  avidity  everything  I  could  find 
to  reinforce  my  faith.  I  found  great  comfort 
in  Kitto's  books  ;  but  though  I  would  feel 
satisfied  after  each  particular  explanation, 
there  would  remain,  as  the  net  result  of  the 
inquiry,  an  uncomfortable  feeling  that  too 
much  ingenuity  had  been  needed,  that  simple 
truth  should  scarcely  require  so  very  much 
special  pleading.  Still,  the  positive  evidence 
for  the  inspiration  and  authority  of  the  Bible 
was  so  strong  that  I  was  content  to  leave 
these  diflficulties  in  abeyance ;  and  in  this 
state  of  mind  I  began  my  ministerial  work 
forty-four  years  ago. 

It  will  show  how  thoroughly  I  was  imbued 
with  the  old  view  of  the   Bible,  if  I  make 


PERSONAL   FOREWORD  5 

the  confession  that  in  my  early  ministry  I 
wasted  many  precious  hours  in  trying  to  make 
sermons  out  of  quite  impossible  texts.  If 
the  Bible  was  all  equally  the  Word  of  God, 
why  should  I  not  be  able  to  use  even  the 
least  promising  parts  of  it  ?  It  was  only  by 
sad  experience  that  I  was  compelled  practi- 
cally to  admit  that  it  was  not  all  on  the  same 
level.  Meanwhile,  in  spite  of  me,  the  feeling 
was  growing  that  surely  there  must  be  some- 
thing wrong  with  the  idea  of  inspiration  in 
which  I  had  been  brought  up.  It  was  only 
very  gradually  that  relief  came ;  but  I  can 
well  remember  several  distinct  stages,  which 
it  may  be  useful  to  specify. 

The  first  I  clearly  remember  came  from 
the  use  of  Alford's  Greek  Testament,  espe- 
cially from  the  position  he  put  so  strongly 
that  not  the  words  but  the  men  were  inspired. 
In  that  case  they  were  not  merely  scribes, 
they  were  men,  and  the  introduction  of  the 
human  element,  as  real  and  not  merely  formal, 
suggested  many  things. 

Another  great  relief  later  on  came  from  a 
book  of  Mr.  Miall,  the  name  of  which  I 
now  forget,  but  the  thought  insisted  on  was 
that  the  Bible  was  not  itself  the  divine 
revelation,  but  the  record  of  it.    This  thought 


6  PERSONAL  FOREWORD 

gave  me  immense  help,  and  sensibly  reduced 
the  effect  of  the  difficulties  and  perplexities 
which  still  disturbed  me. 

Some  time  after,  I  became  acquainted 
with  Lessing's  tractate  on  "  The  Education 
of  the  Human  Race,"  which  for  the  first  time 
brought  me  in  sight  of  the  progressive  nature 
of  divine  revelation  ;  and  about  the  same 
time  I  found  help  in  Mozley's  "  Ruling  Ideas 
in  Early  Ages."  I  had  been  wrestling  hard 
with  some  of  the  toughest  parts  of  the  Book 
of  Judges,  and  can  remember  still  what  an 
immense  relief  it  was  to  realize  that  the 
lesson  to  be  learned  there  was  not  the 
vengeance  of  God,  but  His  patience  with  a 
dark  and  cruel  age. 

About  this  time  I  was  revelling  in  Browning. 
It  was  not  then  the  fashion  to  admire  him  ; 
but,  hearing  that  there  were  some  few  who 
had  discovered  hid  treasure  of  great  price 
in  his  poems,  I  began  to  look  into  them, 
and  presently  came  across  the  Epistle  of 
Kharshish,  which  I  found  so  marvellously 
suggestive  on  the  story  of  Lazarus  that  I 
tried  next  the  story  of  Saul.  In  reading 
this  wonderful  poem,  I  had  my  first  glimpse 
of  the  modern  view  of  inspiration.  It  was 
to  me  then  an  entirely  fresh  unfolding  of  the 


PERSONAL   FOREWORD  7 

human  side  of  the  experience — the  natural 
powers  of  David's  soul  in  fullest  exercise, 
and  a  great  unselfish  love  arising  within  him 
till  it  completely  filled  his  heart,  and  then, 
and  only  then,  the  great  message  coming  to 
him — a  message  which  came  not  apart  from, 
but  in  and  through  the  working  of  his  own 
mind  and  heart,  leading  in  the  most  natural 
way  to  the  startling  climax,  "  See  the  Christ 
stand ! "  Yet  the  supernatural  is  by  no 
means  eliminated,  but  comes  in  what  may 
be  called  the  most  natural  way,  as  so  beauti- 
fully shown  in  the  opening  of  Stanza  XIV. — 

"  And  behold  while  I  sang  .  . .  but  O  Thou  who  didst  grant 

me,  that  day, 
And,  before  it,  not  seldom  hast  granted  thy  help  to  essay, 
Carry  on  and  complete  an  adventure,— my  shield  and  my 

sword 
In  that  act  where  my  soul  was  thy  servant,  thy  word  was  my 

word, — 
Still  help  me,  who  then  at  the  summit  of  human  endeavour 
And  scaling  the  highest  man's  thought  could,  gazed  hopeless 

as  ever 
On  the  new  stretch  of  heaven  above  me — till,  mighty  to  save, 
Just  one  lift  of  thy  hand  cleared  that  distance." 

For  me,  the  reading  of  that  poem  put  an 
end  to  the  old  mechanical,  unnatural  view 
of  inspiration  which  reduces  the  sacred 
writers  to  mere  amanuenses. 


8  PERSONAL  FOREWORD 

Another  epoch  in  my  mental  history  was 
the  reading  of  Bruce 's  *'  Chief  End  of  Revela- 
tion." This  crystallized  for  me  the  view  of 
the  Bible  which  had  been  for  many  years 
growing  in  my  mind,  making  it  clear  that 
the  perfection  to  be  looked  for  in  Scripture 
is  not  absolute  perfection,  but  perfection  for 
the  purpose  for  which  it  is  given,  its  un- 
paralleled adaptation  to  the  fulfilment  of  its 
"  chief  end."  By  this  time  the  critical  views 
of  the  Old  Testament  had  been  gaining 
ground.  When  they  were  first  broached,  I 
had  been  among  the  strongest  in  opposition. 
I  well  remember  with  what  prejudice  I  read 
Macdonald  on  the  Pentateuch,  especially  as 
what  he  brought  forward  promised  to  spoil 
a  great  many  of  my  sermons ;  but  I  felt 
bound  to  read  it,  if  not  to  accept,  then  to 
refute,  his  position.  And  in  the  same  way 
I  have  felt  it  my  duty  ever  since,  so  far  as 
time  would  allow,  to  make  myself  acquainted 
with  the  work  of  the  more  spiritual  critics, 
and  have  found  thus  a  very  great  help  in 
the  clearing  away  of  old  difficulties,  and  in 
reaching  a  conviction  of  the  inspiration  and 
authority  of  the  sacred  Scriptures  far  stronger 
and  more  satisfactory  than  I  ever  had  in 
the  old  days,   when  the  difficulties,  though 


PERSONAL  FOREWORD  9 

explained  away,  were  never  cleared  away, 
but  remained  as  a  counter-weight  to  the 
accumulated  evidence  for  the  faith. 

It  was  in  this  way  that  I  came  out  of  the 
comparative  darkness  into  better  light ;  and 
it  is  in  the  hope  that  I  may  help  some  others 
into  the  same  clear  and  unclouded  conviction 
of  the  inspiration  and  authority  of  the  Sacred 
Scriptures,  that  I  try  in  this  book  to  show 
the  immense  gains  which  have  come  from 
the  frank  recognition  of  all  the  facts  before  us, 
and  from  basing  on  these  our  theory  of  in- 
spiration, instead  of  first  settling  our  theory 
and  then  trying  to  force  the  facts  to  fit  into  it. 

In  this  series,  as  in  all  the  others  issued 
by  the  National  Free  Church  Council,  each 
writer  bears  the  sole  responsibility  for  the 
views  set  forth  in  his  pages.  For  myself,  I 
can  only  say  that  I  do  not  regard  this  re- 
sponsibility lightly ;  but  I  am  helped  to  bear 
the  weight  of  it  by  the  knowledge,  which 
I  am  not  ashamed  to  avow,  that  the  work 
has  been  begun,  continued,  and  ended  with 
the  desire,  and  in  the  hope  and  prayer,  that 
God  may  use  it  to  lead  some  doubting  souls 
into  clearer  light,  and  to  settle  believers  in 
a  firmer  and  more  steadfast  faith. 


PART   I 

INTRODUCTORY 


CHAPTER   I 
The  Inspiration  with  which  we  have  to  do 

WE  must  begin  by  trying  to  get  a  clear 
view  of  the  main  subject  with  which 
we  have  to  deal.  This  may  be  best  done 
by  an  examination  of  the  word  "  inspiration," 
which  is  used  in  so  many  senses  that  it  may 
mean  anything  or  nothing,  so  far  as  our 
subject  is  concerned.  There  is  first  a  very 
broad  sense  in  which  all  of  us  are  inspired : 
**  There  is  a  spirit  in  man,  and  the  inspira- 
tion of  the  Almighty  hath  given  him  under- 
standing." That  is  what  may  be  called 
inspiration  in  its  widest  sense. 

More  familiar  is  the  narrower  sense  of  the 
word  as  limited  to  a  select  few — men  of 
genius,  to  wit :  the  poet,  the  artist,  the 
musician.  Equally  with  the  last,  this  may 
be  called  natural  inspiration,  for  ''the  poet 
is  born,  not  made  "  ;  genius  is  the  dowry  of 
nature.      To    the    same   category    we    may 

13 


14  VARIOUS   MEANINGS 

perhaps  assign  the  inspiration  of  Bezaleel 
and  Aholiab,  and  of  Samson  and  Gideon. 
In  all  these  cases  the  term  is  correctly  enough 
used,  inasmuch  as  it  is  the  divine  Spirit 
from  whom  come  those  powers  which  make 
up  ordinary  human  intelligence,  and  also 
those  special  gifts  with  which  nature's  elite 
are  endowed.  Let  us  then  call  all  this 
natural  inspiration^  and  set  it  aside  as  irrele- 
vant to  our  subject,  except  in  so  far  as  it 
lies  at  the  base  of  the  higher  inspiration, 
which  acts  often  through  a  quickening  and 
enlightening  of  natural  genius. 

Quite  distinct  from  both  of  these  is  the 
inspiration  which  comes  not  by  nature  but 
by  grace,  mediated  by  Christ  (even  retrospec- 
tively in  the  Old  Testament),  and  bestowed 
in  answer  to  prayer.  There  is  here  direct 
personal  contact  of  the  Spirit  of  God  with 
the  spirit  of  man.  Let  us  then  call  it,  for 
the  sake  of  distinction,  spiritual  inspiratioji. 
But  this  again  admits  of  degrees.  As  before, 
there  is  a  broad  sense  in  which  all  Christians 
are  inspired.  The  Spirit  is  given  to  all  who 
ask ;  and,  on  the  other  hand,  "If  any  man 
have  not  the  Spirit  of  Christ,  he  is  none  of 
His."  But  while  all  true  Christians  are  in 
a  measure  inspired,  it    is    in  very  different 


OF   INSPIRATION  15 

degrees,  varying  from  the  first  breath  of  the 
new  life  up  to  the  measure  of  the  soul's 
capacity  as  indicated  by  the  apostolic  phrase, 
''  filled  with  the  Spirit."  No  one  can  deny 
to  this  inbreathing  of  the  Spirit  the  name 
of  inspiration  ;  but  it  carries  with  it  no 
authority.  Not  that  it  is  limited  to  the 
recipient  only,  for  those  who  have  received 
the  Spirit  are  called  to  impart  to  others,  and 
when  the  measure  in  which  the  Spirit  is 
received  is  abundant,  the  outflow  is  abundant 
also — "  rivers  of  living  water,"  as  the  Saviour 
puts  it,  flowing  out  from  the  soul.  We  have 
all  known  or  heard  of  notable  examples  of 
this.  But  while  there  is  influence — often 
great  and  blessed  influence — in  such  cases  we 
recognize  no  authority.  Even  a  Spurgeon 
cannot  claim  the  right  to  determine  matters 
of  faith  and  duty.  All  this  further  content 
of  the  word  "  inspiration,"  therefore,  must  be 
set  aside  as  irrelevant  to  our  subject. 

Let  it  be  observed,  however,  that  all  this 
range  of  inspiration  of  the  kind  we  have 
spoken  of  as  spiritual,  presupposes  much. 
We  have  said  that  it  means  direct  personal 
contact  of  the  Spirit  of  God  with  the  spirit  of 
man,  that  it  is  mediated  by  Christ,  and  that 
it  is  not  of  nature,  but  of  grace.     But  who  is 


i6  VARIOUS   MEANINGS 

God  ?  Who  is  Christ  ?  What  is  grace  ? 
It  is  evident  that  the  inspiration  which  is 
spiritual  does  not  spring  out  of  the  ground, 
nor  does  it  come  down  from  heaven  ready- 
made.  It  is  clearly  the  result  of  something 
that  has  g^one  before.  It  is  throuo^hout 
based  on  a  prior  revelation.  The  inspira- 
tion of  the  Christian  has  to  do  with  the 
application  of  that  which  has  been  given  and 
is  now  complete.  But  how  was  it  given  ? 
How  has  it  come  into  our  possession  ? 

The  answer  to  this  question  throws  us 
back  on  another  kind  of  inspiration — the 
inspiration  of  those  who  were  chosen  of  God 
to  be  the  vehicles  of  that  redemptive  reve- 
lation which  was  to  be  the  basis  of  fellow- 
ship with  God  through  all  succeeding  ages. 
Just  as  in  natural  inspiration  there  are  the 
select  geniuses  who  are  often  pioneers  and 
mark  out  a  track  for  other  men  to  follow, 
so  in  the  spiritual  inspiration  there  must  be 
pioneers,  geniuses  of  inspiration  as  it  were, 
through  whom  the  revelation  originally 
comes. 

Now  that  is  just  where  we  find  ourselves 
in  our  present  inquiry.  We  of  these  later 
days  have  fallen  heirs  to  a  great  revelation 
beginning  in  the  earliest  times,  waxing  ever 


OF   INSPIRATION  17 

clearer  and  fuller  till  it  culminates  in  the 
pure  white  light  of  the  revelation  of  God 
in  Christ.  It  is  with  this  period  of  the 
giving  of  revelation  our  inquiry  has  to  do, 
and  we  shall  find  that  during  its  course, 
in  the  accomplishment  of  its  gracious  pur- 
pose, there  was  called  for  and  there  came 
forth  an  inspiration  sui  generis,  which  had 
as  its  special  characteristic  the  quality  of 
originality  and  the  note  of  authority  :  origi- 
nality, for  it  was  a  matter  of  revelation,  the 
unveiling  of  that  which  had  been  hidden 
from  the  ages  and  the  generations ;  and 
authority,  for  a  revelation  on  which  the  ages 
to  come  were  to  be  nourished  must  bear 
unequivocal  marks  of  having  come  from 
God,  to  Whom  they  owed  themselves.  Let 
us  call  this,  then,  in  distinction  from  all 
other  kinds  of  inspiration  of  which  we  have 
been  speaking,  revelational  (or  especially 
redemptive)  inspiration.  It  is  with  this,  and 
this  alone,  that  we  have  to  do. 

Let  it  be  noted  in  passing  that  this  way 
of  approaching  the  subject  does  away  with 
a  difficulty  which  has  often  been  raised, 
namely,  the  ceasing  of  what  we  may,  in 
view  of  our  present  subject,  call  inspiration 
proper.     If  the  line  of  demarcation  between 

c 


1 8  VARIOUS  MEANINGS 

the  authoritative  and  non-authoritative  had 
been  a  date  arbitrarily  selected,  then  it 
would  be  hard  to  show  the  reasonableness 
of  that  high  inspiration  coming  to  an  end. 
Why  should  there  be  a  difference  between 
the  inspiration  of  Paul  and  the  inspiration 
of  Wesley  ?  But  when  we  consider  that 
redemptive  revelation  was  a  gradual  process, 
and  that  it  culminated  in  what  is  known  as 
**  the  fulness  of  the  times "  when  all  that 
was  needed  as  the  foundation  of  the  new 
life  had  been  given  in  full,  we  can  readily 
see  that  the  particular  kind  of  inspiration 
should  cease  with  the  call  for  it.  Connected 
as  it  was  with  the  giving  of  a  revelation,  it 
would  naturally  come  to  an  end  when  the 
revelation  was  fully  given,  and  nothing 
remained  but  the  acceptance  and  eluci- 
dation and  application  of  that  which  had 
been  revealed. 

This  natural  distinction  is  often  missed  by 
excellent  men  who  wish  to  emphasize  the 
fact  that  God  has  not  ceased  to  dwell  with 
man  and  to  speak  with  him,  and  to  send 
into  the  world  men  of  light  and  leading  and 
genuine  inspiration.  All  this  is,  of  course, 
perfectly  true,  but  it  does  not  set  aside 
the  fact  that  the  revelation  of  divine  grace 


OF   INSPIRATION  19 

found  Its  culmination  in  Christ,  so  that  we 
do  not  "look  for  another"  such  as  He  was  ; 
and  whatever  advances  are  made  In  the 
apprehension  of  God  in  Christ,  are  advances 
In  apprehension  and  appreciation,  not  new 
revelations.  We  have  no  quarrel  with  the 
great  truth  which  was  In  the  poet  Lowell's 
mind  when  he  wrote  : 

"  Slowly  the  Bible  of  the  race  is  writ, 

And  not  on  paper  leaves  nor  leaves  of  stone  ; 
Each  age,  each  kindred  adds  to  it 

Texts  of  despair  or  hope,  of  joy  or  moan. 
While  springs  the  sea,  while  mists  the  mountain  shroud. 
While  thunder's  surges  burst  on  clefts  of  cloud, 
Still  at  the  prophets'  feet  the  nations  sit." 

But  It  Is  evident  that  the  words  **  Bible  " 
at  the  beginning  and  "  prophets "  at  the 
end  of  our  quotation  are  employed  in  a 
wide  and  general  sense,  justified  by  usage, 
as,  in  speaking  of  Carlyle  and  Ruskin  as 
prophets  we  mean  by  it  that  they  had 
a  message  from  God,  but  do  not  suggest 
thereby  that  they  occupied  precisely  the 
same  position  as  that  of  the  inspired  men 
who  took  part  In  the  revelation  of  God 
which  found  Its  completion  and  perfection  In 
Christ. 

We  have  been  gradually  limiting  the 
reference  of  the  word  "  inspiration  "  till  we 


20  VARIOUS  MEANINGS 

have  reached  that  specific  kind  which  is 
the  subject  of  our  inquiry,  namely,  the 
inspiration  which,  having  to  do  with  the 
giving  of  the  revelation  of  God  culminating 
in  Christ,  had  in  it  notes  of  originality  and 
authority  wanting  in  later  authors,  who  may 
nevertheless  be  regarded  as  inspired  in  a 
wider  sense.  But  we  have  attempted  no 
definition.  To  attempt  a  definition  at  this 
stage  would  be  a  begging  of  the  question, 
a  settling  beforehand  what  ought  to  be  the 
result  of  our  inquiry.  Besides,  it  would  be 
precluded  by  the  fact  that  even  in  this 
narrowed  definition  of  our  term  there  are 
still  degrees  of  inspiration  to  be  considered. 

Here  we  touch  a  point  of  controversy  on 
which  we  shall  not  at  present  enlarge ;  let 
it  suf^ce  to  mark  out  one  difference  of 
degree  concerning  which  there  will  be  agree- 
ment. I  refer  to  that  indicated  in  the  com- 
prehensive utterance  with  which  the  Epistle 
to  the  Hebrews  opens,  an  utterance  which 
covers  the  whole  period  of  the  giving  of 
revelation  :  "  God,  who  at  sundry  times  and 
in  divers  manners  spake  in  time  past  unto 
the  fathers  by  the  prophets,  hath  in  these  last 
days  spoken  unto  us  by  His  Son."  Then 
follows  a   great   passage   which    marks    out 


OF   INSPIRATION  21 

the  preeminence  of  Him  in  whom  the  reve- 
lation culminates,  showing  Him  as  the  fount 
rather  than  the  channel  of  inspiration.  And 
even  when  He  is  regarded  as  the  subject  of 
inspiration,  the  distinction  is  still  maintained, 
as  when  St.  John  says  the  Spirit  was  given 
without  measure  to  Him,  implying  that  it 
was  only  in  measure  to  others.  God  spoke 
in  Him  with  a  fulness,  completeness,  supre- 
macy of  authority  for  which  there  is  no 
parallel.  It  is  a  similar  kind  of  inspiration 
certainly,  but  by  no  means  of  the  same 
superlative  degree,  in  which  God  spoke 
through  the  prophets.  And  in  the  same 
way  as  God  spoke  through  the  prophets, 
Christ  spoke  through  the  apostles.  Their 
inspiration  then  was  on  another  plane  than 
the  manifestation  of  God  in  Christ,  in  which 
His  inspiration  consisted.  And  it  is  the 
nature  and  extent  of  their  inspiration  with 
which  we  have  to  do  when  we  speak  of 
the  inspiration  of  the  Scriptures  ;  for  while 
Christ  and  His  Cross  is  the  subject  of  the 
Bible  as  a  whole,  He  is  not  the  author  of  a 
single  book  or  a  single  line  in  it.  His 
writing  was  on  lives,  not  on  parchment 
leaves.  The  great  question  for  us  then  is, 
What  are  we  to  understand  by  God  speaking 


22  INSPIRATION 

through  the  Prophets  and  Christ  speaking 
through  the  Apostles  ?  It  is  not,  therefore, 
the  very  highest  degree  of  inspiration  with 
which  we  have  to  deal  ;  but  that  which  ap- 
proaches most  nearly  to  it — the  inspiration, 
specially  of  the  Prophets  and  Apostles  and 
generally  of  all  the  writers  of  the  books 
w^hich  are  known  as  the  Holy  Scriptures. 

In  following  out  our  inquiry  we  shall  find, 
first  (in  Part  II.)  an  elect  nation  called  of 
God  to  receive  and  convey  to  the  world 
His  message  of  salvation,  and  next  (in 
Part  III.)  individual  men  selected  and 
empowered  by  the  agency  of  His  Spirit  to 
make  the  message  articulate — the  witness  of 
all  converging  on  Him  who  is  the  Word 
of  God,  and  by  whose  sacrifice  alone  the 
world  can  be  redeemed. 


CHAPTER   II 

The  Field  to  be  Explored 

OUR  title  says  "  the  Inspiration  and 
Authority  of  the  Bible."  "  The  Bible" 
then  is  the  field  to  be  explored.  We  have 
been  accustomed  from  our  childhood  to 
understand  by  the  Bible  a  single  well-known 
book  which  we  believe  to  have  been  pro- 
duced by  that  special  inspiration  which  has 
to  do  with  the  giving  of  revelation.  But 
when  we  examine  our  Bible,  we  find  that 
it  is  not  one  book  but  sixty-six ;  and  in  fact 
the  word  Bible  is  not  a  correct  translation 
of  the  title  first  given  to  the  Scriptures  by 
Chrysostom,  for  the  name  he  gave  was  Ta 
BtjSXta,  not  the  book,  but  the  books. 

On  what  principle  have  these  sixty-six 
books  been  chosen  as  of  special  inspiration  ? 
If  we  have  to  defend  the  claims  of  every 
one  of  them,  and  to  form  our  theory  of  the 
nature  of  inspiration  from  what  we  find  in 

23 


24  THE   FIELD 

them  all,  we  ought  to  know  the  authority  for 
including  all  these,  and  these  only,  in  **  the 
Bible."  They  certainly  do  not  all  claim  for 
themselves  to  be  given  by  inspiration  of 
God.  Very  few  of  them  do.  Many  of  them, 
especially  the  Prophets  in  the  Old  Testa- 
ment and  the  Apostle  Paul  in  the  New, 
make  the  claim,  not  indeed  for  the  books, 
but  for  the  message  which  the  books  contain. 
But  the  claim  is  made  for  them  all — by 
whom  ? 

(i)  First  as  to  the  Old  Testament.  Our 
Lord  evidently  deals  with  the  Old  Testament 
Scriptures  of  His  day  as  given  by  inspira- 
tion of  God,  and  the  famous  passage  in  the 
Epistle  of  Paul  to  Timothy  gives  a  similar 
testimony.  But  how  many  books  are  thus 
certified  ?  There  were  two  collections  of 
sacred  Scripture  then  in  existence,  both  in 
current  use,  the  Hebrew  original  and  the 
Septuagint  translation.  The  latter  was  much 
the  more  familiar,  for  the  original  Hebrew 
was  by  that  time  a  dead  language,  and, 
indeed,  it  was  through  targums,  translations 
and  paraphrases  into  the  vulgar  tongue,  that 
the  Hebrew  collection  was  best  known. 
Moreover,  it  is  from  the  Septuagint  that  the 
quotations   of  our  Lord    Himself  and   His 


TO   BE   EXPLORED  25 

Apostles  are  most  frequently  taken.  But 
the  Septuagint  included  many  more  than  the 
thirty-nine  books  we  now  have  in  the  Old 
Testament ;  it  included  the  whole  of  the 
Apocrypha,  not  separated  from  the  rest  as 
is  customary  in  English  Bibles  which  contain 
it,  but  mixed  in  with  the  other  books.  Are 
we  to  understand  then  that  our  Lord  certifies 
the  whole  of  the  Apocrypha  as  of  equal 
authority  with  the  other  books  ?  This 
would  broaden  the  field  of  inquiry  very 
considerably,  and  largely  increase  our  diffi- 
culties. If,  on  the  other  hand,  we  assume 
that  He  only  meant  to  certify  the  Hebrew 
collection,  as  might  be  argued  from  His 
reference  to  "the  Law  of  Moses,  and  the 
Prophets,  and  the  Psalms,"  in  Luke  xxiv. 
44,  we  have  still  the  fact  to  deal  with  that 
He  left  no  warning  against  treating  the  whole 
of  the  Septuagint  as  authoritative.  From 
which  we  gather  that  for  some  reason  or 
other  He  did  not  consider  the  subject  of 
vital  importance.  This  may  seem  strange 
to  some  good  people,  but  it  is  a  fact ;  and  it 
is  our  duty  as  loyal  disciples  of  our  blessed 
Lord,  to  accept  the  position  He  takes  in 
the  matter  without  venturing  to  criticize  it. 
We    shall,   I    believe,    afterwards    find   that 


26  THE   FIELD 

there  is  excellent  reason  for  His  not  being 
precise  in  His  teaching  in  this  particular. 

But  even  if  we  had  good  reason  for  re- 
stricting our  Lord's  certification  to  the  sacred 
Scriptures  according  to  the  Hebrew  collec- 
tion, we  still  are  in  difficulty,  inasmuch  as 
we  cannot  tell  how  many  books  it  contained 
at  the  time  of  our  Lord ;  for  the  Hebrew 
canon,  including  the  books  we  now  have, 
was  not  made  up  till  more  than  half  a 
century  after  our  Lord's  death.  There 
were  doubts  and  disputes  going  on  among 
the  Hebrew  authorities  as  to  Esther,  Pro- 
verbs, Song  of  Solomon,  Ecclesiastes,  and 
Ezekiel.  It  was  not  till  a.d.  90  that  the 
canon  of  the  Hebrew  Old  Testament  was 
made  up  as  we  have  it  now,  and  even  then 
the  authorities  were  not  unanimous.  The 
decision  was  by  majority.  And  though 
there  was  this  indeterminateness  as  to  the 
Hebrew  canon  in  our  Lord's  time.  He 
does  not  consider  the  matter  of  sufficient 
importance  to  give  authoritative  pronounce- 
ment as  to  the  number  of  books  to  be 
included.  This  again  is  a  fact  which  is 
not  to  be  set  aside,  but  reverently  accepted 
in  the  spirit  of  loyal  trust. 

(2)  As  to  the   New  Testament   we  have 


TO   BE   EXPLORED  27 

no  guidance  whatever  from  our  Lord  or 
His  Apostles,  except  indeed  our  Lords 
special  promise  to  His  Apostles  to  guide 
them  into  all  truth  and  bring  all  things  to 
their  remembrance,  which  would  give  a 
sanction  to  such  books  of  the  New  Testa- 
ment as  were  of  apostolic  authorship.  There 
are  those,  indeed,  who  have  appealed  to  the 
solemn  warning  at  the  close  of  the  Book  of 
Revelation  against  adding  to  or  taking  away 
from  '*  the  words  of  the  book  of  this  pro- 
phecy," contending  that  it  is  an  apostolic 
certificate  of  the  twenty-seven  books  of  the 
New  Testament,  or  even  of  the  sixty-six 
books  of  the  Bible,  as  containing  all,  and 
alone  containing,  God's  authoritative  revela- 
tion ;  but  no  intelligent  person  can  take  this 
ground  now.  "  The  book  of  this  prophecy  " 
is  the  book  in  which  the  passage  occurs, 
namely,  the  Apocalypse  ;  and,  as  a  matter  of 
fact,  several  of  the  books  of  the  New  Testa- 
ment were  not  then  in  existence,  and  most 
certainly  there  was  no  volume  of  the  New 
Testament,  or  of  the  Bible  as  a  whole,  till 
long  after  this  sentence  was  written.  We 
must  then  have  in  view  the  fact  that  we 
have  no  means  of  knowing  the  mind  of 
Christ  or  of  His  Apostles  as  to  the   exact 


28  THE   FIELD 

number  of  the  books  to  be  included  in  the 
Bible. 

How  then  was  our  present  Bible  made  up  ? 
The  answer  to  this  is  long  and  difficult.  If 
the  matter  had  been  of  supreme  importance, 
we  may  be  sure  that  we  should  have  had  a 
voice  from  heaven  or  some  quite  decided 
intimation  of  the  divine  mind.  But  instead 
of  this  there  are  long  discussions  as  to  some 
of  the  books,  both  of  the  Old  Testament  and 
the  New,  leading  gradually  to  a  general 
acquiescence  in  regard  to  the  thirty  -  nine 
books  of  the  Old  Testament  and  the  twenty- 
seven  of  the  New  which  we  now  have,  but 
with  a  mark  of  question  left  against  a  few 
which  are  spoken  of  as  "  deutero-canonical " 
(z.e.  canonical  in  a  secondary  and  somewhat 
doubtful  sense),  to  distinguish  them  from 
those  which  are  acknowledged  by  all  to  be 
canonical.  But  there  still  remains  a  dis- 
tinct cleavage  as  to  the  books  known  as 
the  Apocrypha;  for  these  are  all  accepted 
by  the  Roman  Catholic  Church  as  equally 
canonical  with  the  rest,  while  the  Reformers 
rejected  them.  In  this  connection  it  is  worth 
noting  that  there  had  been  so  much  vague- 
ness as  to  the  canon  of  Scripture  for  some 
fifteen  centuries,  that  the  Council  of  Trent, 


TO   BE   EXPLORED  29 

meeting  in  1546,  found  it  necessary  to  make 
an  authoritative  declaration  as  to  the  canon 
of  Scripture ;  which  shows  that  there  was  no 
previous  pronouncement  decided  enough  to 
suit  their  purpose.  On  the  other  hand,  there 
were  similar  pronouncements  from  the  side 
of  the  Reformation,  such  as  the  list  of  books 
in  the  Thirty-Nine  Articles  of  the  Anglican 
Church,  distinguishing  the  sixty-six  books 
which  it  recognized  as  canonical  from  the 
books  of  the  Apocrypha  which  may  be  read 
"  for  example  of  life  and  instruction  of  man- 
ners," but  "  not  to  establish  any  doctrine  "  ; 
and  the  list  of  books  in  the  Westminster  Con- 
fession of  Faith  which  coincides  exactly  with 
what  we  understand  now  by  "The  Bible." 

While  then  we  have  no  distinct  and 
definite  divine  authority  for  including  all 
our  sixty-six  books  and  none  besides,  we 
have  a  general  consensus  of  Christian  opinion, 
including  all  the  Churches  of  the  Reformation 
as  well  as  the  Church  of  Rome,  as  to  the 
canonicity  of  these  books.  We  may  there- 
fore take  as  the  field  to  be  explored  : 

(a)  The  books  which  come  to  us  on  pro- 
phetic or  apostolic  authority ; 

(d)  Those  which,  though  not  bearing  the 
names  of  apostles  or  prophets,  have  yet  been 


30  THE   FIELD 

recognized  as  canonical  by  what  may  be 
called  universal  consent ;  and 

{c)  Those  which  have  not  been  universally 
acknowledged,  yet  have  established  such  a 
claim  as  to  have  found  a  place  in  the  col- 
lection of  sacred  Scriptures,  which  has  sur- 
vived the  controversies  of  fifteen  centuries, 
and  is  now  generally  accepted. 

The  importance  of  keeping  these  distinc- 
tions in  mind  will  be  recognized  when  we 
consider  that  while  we  have  to  deal  with 
facts  gathered  from  the  whole  field,  we  do 
not  feel  exactly  the  same  responsibility  for 
what  we  find  in  much  disputed  books,  such 
as  Esther  in  the  Old  Testament  or  the 
second  Epistle  of  Peter  in  the  New,  as 
we  have  in  the  writings  of  clearly  authenti- 
cated Apostles  and  Prophets.  And  those 
who  are  acquainted  with  the  Apocrypha  will 
recognize  what  a  relief  it  is  to  be  free  from 
the  necessity  of  claiming  special  inspiration 
for  all  the  books  which  it  contains. 

Let  it  be  noticed,  before  passing  from  the 
subject  of  the  canon,  that  our  faith  does  not 
depend  at  all  on  the  canonicity  of  those 
books  concerning  which  the  evidence  is  not 
quite  complete.  If  we  were  restricted  to 
those  portions  of  the  Bible  which  have  all 


TO   BE   EXPLORED  31 

the  marks  of  canonicity — those  books  which 
can  be  proved  to  have  been  clearly  in  the 
mind  of  Christ  when  He  used  the  Old 
Testament  Scriptures,  and  those  parts  of 
the  New  Testament  which  are  clearly  of 
apostolic  authority, — we  should  still  have  a 
sufficient  basis  to  establish  not  only  faith  in 
God  and  in  His  Son  Jesus  Christ,  but  also 
all  the  truths  which  are  of  vital  importance 
to  our  salvation  and  eternal  life.  We  need 
not  then  vex  our  souls  in  the  slightest  degree 
that  we  have  no  supernatural  certification  of 
all  the  books  of  the  Bible.  We  ought  rather 
to  acknowledge  with  adoring  gratitude  that, 
while  there  is  some  doubt  as  to  outlying 
parts  of  Scripture,  there  is  abundance  in 
those  parts  which  are  fully  certified  to  lead 
the  soul  from  darkness  into  light,  to  guide 
any  earnest  inquirer  to  the  Saviour  of  man- 
kind. We  need  not  find  fault  with  the 
penumbra,  if  the  central  luminary  shines 
clear  and  glorious. 


CHAPTER   III 
The  Method  of  Exploration 

NOW  that  we  see  clearly  what  it  is  we 
have  to  study,  the  next  question  is  as 
to  the  method  we  should  follow.  Shall  we 
first  settle  in  our  own  minds  the  precise 
nature  and  extent  of  inspiration  according  to 
our  ideas  of  what  God  ought  to  do,  or  is 
likely  to  do ;  then  diligently  seek  out  all  that 
can  be  found  in  the  Scriptures  themselves 
which  seem  to  confirm  our  view,  and  when 
anything  is  observed  that  seems  to  conflict 
with  it,  either  leave  it  out  of  account  or 
ingeniously  explain  it  away  ?  This  is  the 
method  which  has  till  quite  recently  been 
most  popular  with  the  defenders  of  the 
authoritative  inspiration  of  the  Scriptures. 
They  have  postulated  as  a  necessity  of  the 
case  the  emancipation  of  all  the  writers  of 
Scripture  from  the  effects  of  human  weakness 
and  limitation.     They  have  said  that  if  we 

33 


METHOD  OF   EXPLORATION  33 

cannot  have  the  guarantee  that  every  word 
these  holy  men  of  old  have  written  expresses 
accurately  and  only  the  mind  of  God,  the 
whole  thing  is  useless,  because  if  these  people 
who  are  the  vehicles  of  revelation  cannot  be 
trusted  in  everything,  they  can  be  trusted  in 
nothing.  This  is  what  may  be  called  the 
rationalistic  method  of  proceeding,  for  it 
starts  with  a  theory  framed  in  accordance 
with  what  the  theorist  regards  as  reasonable, 
and  deals  with  all  the  facts  of  the  case  in 
the  light  of  that  theory.  It  is  a  vice  of 
method  precisely  analogous  to  that  of  those 
who  begin  their  study  of  the  Bible  with  a 
theory  of  the  universe  which  seems  to  them 
the  only  reasonable  one,  and  insist  on  making 
everything  they  find  square  with  their  theory. 
This  has  been  the  basis  of  a  great  deal  of 
the  destructive  criticism  which  has  done  so 
much  mischief  in  the  last  generation.  A 
Bible  critic  would  start  with  a  naturalistic 
theory  of  evolution  which  ruled  out  all  divine 
action  as  inadmissible.  Hence  every  state- 
ment which  implies  divine  action  must  either 
be  discredited  and  denied,  or  else  explained 
in  such  a  way  as  to  resolve  the  case  into 
one  of  natural  causation.  Thus  the  Incarna- 
tion, the   Resurrection,  and  all  the  mighty 

D 


34  METHOD  OF   EXPLORATION 

works  of  Christ  must  either  be  denied  or 
explained  away.  Surely  it  is  clear  that  such 
Bible  study  is  wholly  vitiated  by  the  false 
method  of  first  making  your  theory,  and  then 
forcing  the  facts  to  fit  it. 

There  is  this  great  difference  between 
the  two  cases,  that  the  one  uses  the  faulty 
method  for  the  destruction  of  the  authority 
of  the  Bible,  the  other  for  its  defence.  But 
surely  the  end  does  not  justify  the  means  ; 
surely  there  is  mischief,  if  not  disaster,  to 
be  expected  from  the  use  of  a  method  which 
is  wholly  discredited  since  the  time  of  Bacon. 
Indeed,  all  the  progress  of  modern  science 
has  been  attained  by  the  discarding  of  this 
method  and  the  adoption  in  its  place  of 
humbly  sitting  at  the  feet  of  nature,  accept- 
ing all  the  facts,  making  room  for  every  one 
of  them,  and  only  after  all  have  been  looked 
at  and  duly  weighed,  venturing  to  construct 
a  theory  v/hich  will  include  every  one  of 
them. 

An  astronomer  of  the  olden  time  settled 
in  his  mind  first  that  the  universe  might 
be  divided  into  two  parts,  superlunary  and 
sublunary,  the  former  the  abode  of  perfec- 
tion, the  latter  of  imperfection,  and  next  that 
the  circle  was  the  only  perfect  figure ;  then 


METHOD   OF   EXPLORATION  35 

he  would  teach  that  the  orbit  of  all  the 
planets  beyond  the  moon  must  be  circular. 
To  suppose  them  other  than  circular  would 
be  to  ascribe  imperfection  to  that  which  God 
must  have  made  perfect.  Thus  the  matter 
was  settled  beyond  all  contradiction.  The 
modern  astronomer  settles  nothing  in  his 
mind  beforehand.  He  begins  by  studying 
the  facts  of  the  case.  He  examines  with 
care  the  orbits  of  Venus,  Mars,  Jupiter, 
Saturn,  and  finds  that  not  one  of  them  is 
circular,  and  therefore  that  the  theory  of  the 
circle  as  the  only  perfect  figure  must  be 
given  up.  Which  of  these  is  the  correct 
method  of  inquiry  ?     Surely  the  latter. 

It  is  this  latter  and  humbler  method  on 
which  most  reverent  students  of  the  Bible 
now  proceed.  Instead  of  determining  before- 
hand that  God  must  reveal  Himself  in  a 
manner  which  shall  preclude  all  possibility 
of  the  smallest  mistake  or  the  slightest 
imperfection  on  the  part  of  the  agents  whom 
He  will  employ  for  the  accomplishment  of 
His  purpose,  they  set  themselves  to  find 
out  what  God  actually  has  done ;  they  look 
at  the  whole  field  of  Scripture,  try  to  take 
in  all  the  facts,  and  then,  after  having  studied 
them    carefully  and    allowed   each    its   due 


36  METHOD   OF   EXPLORATION 

place,  they  form  their  conclusions  as  to 
the  nature  and  extent  of  the  inspiration 
which  God  has  been  graciously  pleased  to 
employ.  Their  theory  of  inspiration  is 
formed,  not  at  the  beginning,  but  at  the  end 
of  the  inquiry.  It  is  formed,  not  on  the 
rationalistic  principle  of  deciding  it  in  one's 
own  mind,  and  then  drilling  all  the  products 
of  inspiration  in  accordance  with  it,  but  on 
the  modest  principle  of  sitting  at  the  feet 
of  the  inspired  writers,  and  especially  at 
the  feet  of  Christ  Himself,  the  great  Master, 
and  accepting  what  they  find  there  as  in 
accordance  with  the  mind  and  will  of  God. 
The  theory  of  inspiration  so  reached  may 
not  seem  so  satisfactory  as  the  one  made 
in  advance,  just  as  the  ellipse  did  not  seem 
so  satisfactory  as  the  circle ;  but  it  will,  at 
all  events,  be  reached  by  a  method  which 
is  honest  and  straightforward,  free  from  all 
taint  of  rationalism,  ready  to  accept  as  best 
what  God  gives,  though  it  be  not  exactly 
what  we  think  best. 

As  it  is  the  inspiration  connected  with 
revelation  with  which  we  have  to  do,  it  will 
be  well  first  to  investigate  the  facts  discovered 
in  our  field  which  show  God's  method  of 
revelation.     This  will  give  us  a  general  view 


METHOD   OF   EXPLORATION  37 

over  the  whole  field,  after  which  we  shall  be 
in  a  better  position  to  discover  God's  method 
of  inspiration.  This  general  survey  will  show 
us  (i)  that  God  chose  a  particular  nation  to 
be  the  channel  through  which  the  revelation 
should  come ;  (2)  that  it  was  given  by  a 
gradual  process  of  teaching  and  training ; 
(3)  that  it  culminated  in  a  complete  and  final 
revelation  of  God  in  a  human  life. 


PART   II 

INSPIRATION  AND  AUTHORITY  OF 
THE  REVELATION 


CHAPTER   IV 
A  Prophet   Nation 

THE  first  thing  we  notice  when  we  look 
at  the  Bible  is  that  it  is  primarily  a 
history  of  Redemption,  and  secondarily  a 
history  of  the  Hebrew  nation.  The  call 
of  Abraham  comes  early  in  the  first  book, 
and  the  destruction  of  Jerusalem  occurred 
towards  the  end  of  the  apostolic  period. 
We  further  find  that  it  is  to  the  Hebrew 
race  we  owe  the  entire  collection  of  books  ; 
even  the  Apostle  of  the  Gentiles  was  a 
Hebrew  of  the  Hebrews.  The  first  fact 
we  have  to  deal  with,  then,  is  that  of  an 
elect  and  inspired  people — a  nation  singled 
out  from  other  nations  to  receive  God's 
special  redemptive  revelation  and  to  give 
it  to  the  world. 

This  is  not  a  mere  inference  from  the 
general  fact  we  have  just  referred  to.  It 
is   a  claim  distinctly  made  and  continually 

41 


42  A  PROPHET   NATION 

repeated  throughout  the  Bible.  We  read 
that  when  God  called  Abraham  out  of 
Chaldea  to  be  the  founder  of  the  nation, 
it  was  in  order  that  in  him  and  in  his 
seed  all  the  nations  of  the  earth  should  be 
blessed.  When  the  nation  was  constituted 
at  Mount  Sinai,  the  same  high  calling  of 
Israel  was  set  forth  in  a  still  more  distinct 
and  definite  manner:  **Ye  have  seen  what 
I  did  unto  the  Egyptians,  and  how  I  bare 
you  on  eagles'  wings,  and  brought  you  unto 
Myself.  Now  therefore,  if  ye  will  obey 
My  voice  indeed,  and  keep  My  covenant, 
then  ye  shall  be  a  peculiar  treasure  unto 
Me  from  among  all  peoples :  for  all  the 
earth  is  Mine  :  and  ye  shall  be  unto  Me 
a  kingdom  of  priests,  and  an  holy  nation " 
(Exodus  xix.  4-6).  And  though  they  were 
very  far  from  actually  being  a  kingdom  of 
priests  and  a  holy  nation,  yet  the  high 
calling  was  never  quite  lost  sight  of. 
Though  the  nation  as  a  whole  was  faith- 
less, there  were  always  some  faithful  ones 
who  kept  up  the  tradition.  We  find  the 
Psalmists,  for  example,  expressing  them- 
selves in  strains  like  this  :  "  God  be  merciful 
unto  us,  and  bless  us,  and  cause  His  face 
to   shine   upon    us;    that  Thy  way  may  be 


A  PROPHET   NATION  43 

known  upon  earth,  Thy  saving  health  among 
all  nations.  Let  the  peoples  praise  Thee, 
O  God ;  let  all  the  peoples  praise  Thee "  ; 
and  again :  "  Blessed  be  the  Lord  God, 
the  God  of  Israel,  who  only  doeth  wondrous 
things :  and  blessed  be  His  glorious  Name 
for  ever;  and  let  the  whole  earth  be  filled 
with  His  glory,"  which  latter  quotation  is 
specially  to  be  noted  as  being  the  doxology 
with  which  the  second  book  of  the  Psalter 
is  concluded.  The  prophets,  moreover,  kept 
up  the  same  strain,  sounding  a  clearer  and 
ever  clearer  note  as  the  centuries  passed  ; 
and  when  things  grew  darker  and  darker 
with  the  nation,  they  did  not  give  up  the 
hope,  but  centred  it  in  One  coming  who 
should  Himself  fulfil  Israel's  calling,  and 
thus  show  Himself  to  be  **the  Holy  One 
of  Israel."  And  even  when  the  oracles 
seemed  dumb  in  the  centuries  following 
the  captivity,  the  dispersion  was  preparing 
the  way  for  the  fulfilment  of  all  when  the 
Holy  One  of  Israel  at  last  came. 

This  special  calling  of  Israel  is  also  fully 
recognized  in  the  New  Testament.  Our 
Lord  restricted  His  ministry  to  "the  lost 
sheep  of  the  house  of  Israel,"  and  when 
they  rejected   Him,    He  trusted    His  cause 


44  A   PROPHET   NATION 

to  a  few  chosen  men  of  this  same  race.  In 
speaking  to  the  woman  of  Samaria,  He  said, 
"  Salvation  is  of  the  Jews " ;  in  the  same 
way  the  Apostle  Paul,  Apostle  of  the 
Gentiles  though  he  was,  asserted  the  special 
privilege  and  prerogative  of  Israel  (see 
especially  Romans  ix.-xi.) ;  and  in  the  seal- 
ing recorded  in  the  Book  of  Revelation  the 
twelve  tribes  come  first,  and  only  after  them 
a  great  multitude  out  of  every  nation  and 
kindred. 

Now,  it  is  a  very  remarkable  fact  that 
such  a  claim  should  be  made  for  a  particular 
nation,  especially  when  we  know  it  to  have 
been  in  no  other  way  distinguished.  We 
should  never  have  supposed,  from  a  study 
of  the  national  characteristics  and  of  the 
great  facts  of  its  history,  that  Israel  was 
at  all  likely  to  be  a  prophet  nation.  But 
has  it  not  been  so?  Is  it  not  evident  that 
it  has  been  specially  selected  and  specially 
trained  for  the  purpose  of  being  the  channel 
of  divine  truth  to  the  world.-*  We  by  no 
means  assert  that  they  had  a  monopoly  of 
truth,  or  of  divine  guidance.  We  believe 
that  God  has  been  in  all  history,  and  has 
guided  and  controlled  the  destinies  of  all 
the  nations,  and  that  each  one  of  the  great 


A   PROPHET   NATION  45 

nations  in  particular  has  contributed  its 
share  to  the  world's  progress.  We  are 
debtors  to  the  Egyptian,  the  Greek,  and 
the  Roman,  aye,  and  to  the  great  Asiatic 
races.  There  have  been  Lights  of  Asia 
besides  those  which  issued  from  Mount 
Zion.  But  when  all  this  is  acknowledged, 
still  the  Jewish  race  stands  alone,  not  only 
in  the  great  world,  but  even  among  the 
Semitic  races,  which  are  believed  to  have 
been  specially  predisposed  to  religion.  There 
is  no  such  line  of  light  in  the  history  of  any 
other  nation  in  all  the  world.  And  there  is 
no  collection  of  sacred  books  to  be  compared 
for  a  moment  with  those  which  make  up 
our  Bible.  This  statement  does  not  deny 
that  passages  may  be  culled  from  other 
sacred  books  which  might  stand  side  by 
side  with  corresponding  passages  in  the 
Bible  ;  but  when  we  take  it  as  a  whole, 
there  is  nothing  to  compare  with  it. 

It  would  take  a  whole  treatise  fitly  to 
develop  this ;  but  we  shall  refer  only  to 
three  things  which  specially  constituted 
Israel  the  prophet  nation — (i)  their  abiding 
consciousness  of  the  immanence  and  trans- 
cendence of  God,  (2)  their  quenchless  passion 
for  righteousness,  and  (3)  the  growth  through 


46  A  PROPHET   NATION 

all    their    chequered    and    even    disastrous 
history  of  a  lofty  spirituality. 

I.  God-consciousness. 

This  is  the  supreme  interest  throughout. 
The  Hebrew  is  the  only  literature  in  all 
the  world  in  which  God  is  in  all,  through 
all,  and  over  all.  We  are  so  familiar  with 
this  characteristic  of  the  Bible  that  it  seldom 
occurs  to  us  to  think  how  unique  it  is.  The 
only  way  in  which  we  can  catch  the  wonder 
of  it  is  by  comparison  with  other  parallel 
literature.  As  an  illustration  of  this,  we  may 
compare  the  Song  of  Moses  (Exodus  xv.) 
with  the  almost  contemporary  hymn  of  the 
poet  Pentaur,  who  is  sometimes  spoken  of 
as  the  Homer  of  Egypt.  There  is  a  certain 
similarity  in  style,  as  is,  of  course,  to  be 
expected  in  productions  which  belong  to 
the  same  period ;  but  they  are  as  different 
as  possible  in  substance.  The  one  is  full 
of  man  and  his  praises,  while  the  other 
makes  nothing  of  man  (the  name  of  Moses 
is  not  even  once  mentioned  in  it)  and 
everything  of  God.  The  first  three  verses 
sufficiently  indicate  the  tenour  of  the  whole : 
'•  I  will  sing  unto  the  Lord,  for  He  hath 
triumphed    gloriously :    the   horse   and    his 


GOD-CONSCIOUSNESS  47 

rider  hath  He  thrown  into  the  sea.  The 
Lord  is  my  strength  and  song,  and  He  is 
become  my  salvation.  This  is  my  God, 
and  I  will  praise  Him;  my  father's  God, 
and  I  will  exalt  Him.  The  Lord  is  a  man 
of  war  :  the  Lord  is  His  name." 

Such  is  the  strain  of  the  Hebrew  epic ; 
whereas  in  the  Egyptian  one  the  praises 
of  Pharaoh  are  sung  throughout,  and  when 
any  god  of  Egypt  is  referred  to,  it  is  in  some 
such  fashion  as  this :  "  I  (Pharaoh)  have 
built  for  thee  Propylaea,  wonderful  works 
of  stone,  I  have  raised  to  thee  masts  for 
all  times,  I  have  conveyed  the  obelisks  for 
thee  from  the  island  of  Elephantine.  It 
was  I  who  had  brought  for  thee  the  ever- 
lasting stone,  who  caused  the  ships  to  go 
for  thee  on  the  sea,  to  bring  thee  the  pro- 
ducts of  foreign  nations.  Where  has  it 
been  told  that  such  a  thing  was  done  at 
any  other  time  ? "  Comment  is  needless 
on  the  contrast. 

This  feature  is  quite  as  obvious  in  Israel's 
history.  The  writers  are  not  historians, 
they  are  divines.  The  victories  are  the 
victories  of  God,  not  of  Israel ;  their  defeats 
are  the  chastisements  of  God,  and  all 
through   their  varied   experiences    they  are 


48  A   PROPHET  NATION 

under  the  guidance  of  God.  It  is  God 
first,  God  last,  God  midmost,  God  in  every- 
thing. This  comes  out  most  impressively 
in  the  Psalms.  There  is  one  Name  sounded 
out  in  every  Psalm,  in  every  stanza — we 
might  almost  say  in  every  line.  It  is  the 
Name  of  God.  It  is  true  that  this  is  the 
most  intensely  human  book  of  the  Bible, 
emphatically  the  word  of  man.  But  if  we 
think,  not  of  the  speakers,  but  of  what  they 
say,  it  is  in  the  highest  sense  the  word  of 
God.  Man  blots  himself  out,  and  writes 
over  the  space  the  great  Name,  Jehovah. 
It  is  the  nation's  song-book;  but  it  is  not 
the  nation's  doings  that  are  celebrated. 
Their  sinful  doings  are  confessed,  but  the 
great  things,  the  "mighty  deeds,"  are  always 
and  only  the  doings  of  God  for  them.  The 
great  names  in  the  nation's  history  are  con- 
spicuously absent.  There  is  no  panegyric 
of  Abraham,  or  Moses,  or  Joshua,  or  Samson, 
or  Elijah.  If  any  one  is  mentioned,  as 
David  is  several  times,  it  is  never  to  signalize 
the  man,  but  always  to  glorify  God.  There 
had  been  great  wars  and  glorious  victories, 
but  we  find  not  a  word  about  any  Hebrew 
commander ;  there  is  no  WelHngton,  or 
Napoleon,    or    Frederick    the    Great ;     no 


GOD-CONSCIOUSNESS  49 

Csesar,  or  Alexander,  or  Pharaoh  ;  it  is  the 
God  of  battles  whose  praise  fills  all  the 
page.  "Who  is  the  King  of  glory?  The 
Lord,  strong  and  mighty,  the  Lord,  mighty 
in  battle."  "  The  Lord  of  Hosts,  He  is  the 
King  of  glory." 

It  is  the  same  in  the  quieter  and  more 
meditative  Psalms.  The  nature  songs,  for 
example,  are  among  the  finest  ever  written  ; 
but  the  beauties  of  nature  are  all  trans- 
parencies through  which  are  seen  the  glory 
of  God.  And  it  is  the  same  in  the 
songs  of  life.  God  is  all  and  in  all. 
For  the  immanence  of  God  is  a  doctrine 
as  old  as  the  Psalter.  From  beyond  the 
borders  of  the  land  there  comes  the 
wail,  "  Oh,  that  I  knew  where  I  might 
find  Him,  that  I  might  come  even  to  His 
seat."  "I  go  forward,  but  He  is  not  there; 
and  backward,  but  I  cannot  perceive  Him." 
There  is  transcendence,  but  no  immanence. 
Now  listen  to  the  harp  of  Judah  :  "  Whither 
shall  I  go  from  Thy  Spirit  ?  Or  whither 
shall  I  flee  from  Thy  presence  ?  If  I  ascend 
up  into  heaven.  Thou  art  there  ;  if  I  make 
my  bed  in  Sheol,  behold.  Thou  art  there. 
If  I  take  the  wings  of  the  morning,  and 
dwell    in    the    uttermost   parts   of  the   sea ; 


50  A  PROPHET   NATION 

even  there  shall  Thy  hand  lead  me,  and 
Thy  right  hand  shall  hold  me."  The 
thunder  is  His  voice,  the  lightning  is  His 
glance,  the  winds  are  His  angels,  the  clouds 
are  His  chariot ;  fire,  hail,  snow,  stormy  wind 
are  His  servants,  the  shadow  of  a  great  rock 
is  His  shadow,  the  flowing  stream  is  the 
river  of  God.  Immanence  everywhere.  Yet 
transcendence  also :  The  rock  is  "  higher 
than  I  " ;  "  Thou  hast  set  Thy  glory  above 
the  heavens  "  ;  "  Thou  rulest  the  raging  of 
the  sea  "  ;  "  Unto  Thee,  O  Lord,  do  I  lift 
up  my  soul." 

There  are  daring  anthropomorphisms  in- 
deed; but  they  are  never  belittling,  they 
are  only  such  as  pertain  to  the  necessary 
limitations  of  thought  and  language ;  and 
there  is  often  a  majesty  in  them  such  as 
belongs  only  to  the  highest  order  of  poetry. 
There  are  indeed  dull  prosaic  souls  who  find 
in  such  representations  only  vulgar  super- 
stition :  and  one  wonders  whether  they  read 
Shakespeare,  Milton,  and  Wordsworth  in  the 
same  wooden  way.  Recall,  for  example,  the 
two  great  thunder-storm  passages  in  the 
Psalter,  the  storm  on  land  in  Psalm  xxix., 
and  the  storm  at  sea,  perhaps  more  magnifi- 
cent still,  in  Psalm  xviii.,  both  in  the  highest 


GOD-CONSCIOUSNESS  51 

degree  anthropomorphic  :  the  thunder  the 
voice  of  God,  the  lightning  His  arrows,  the 
tempest  "the  blast  of  the  breath  of  His 
nostrils " — all  a  highly  poetic  rendering  of 
the  immanence  of  God  in  the  storm  most 
vividly  realized.  Yet  His  transcendence  far 
above  is  never  forgotten.  When  the  sea- 
storm  is  at  its  height,  and  shipwreck  seems 
inevitable  :  "He  sent  from  above,  He  took 
me ;  He  drew  me  out  of  many  waters." 
And  when  the  land-storm  is  over,  there  is 
the  beautiful  reflection  that  God  was  not 
only  in  the  storm  but  over  it  :  "  The  Lord 
sat  as  king  at  the  flood ;  yea,  the  Lord 
sitteth  as  king  for  ever."  And  then,  when 
the  rain  has  ceased,  and  the  winds  are 
hushed,  and  the  sun  is  shining  out  again, 
what  an  exquisite  note  of  faith  in  view  both 
of  the  might  of  God  in  the  storm  and  the 
peace  of  God  in  the  tranquillity  which  follows 
it:  "The  Lord  will  give  strength  unto  His 
people ;  the  Lord  will  bless  His  people  with 
peace." 

"  Well  roars  the  storm  to  him  who  hears 
A  deeper  voice  across  the  storm  " ; 

or  to  put  the  same  thought  in  the  still  nobler 
language  of  Psalm  xciii.  :  "  The  floods  have 


52  A   PROPHET  NATION 

lifted  up,  O  Lord,  the  floods  have  lifted  up 
their  voice ;  the  floods  lift  up  their  waves. 
But  the  Lord  above  is  mightier  than  the 
noise  of  many  waters,  yea,  than  the  mighty 
waves  of  the  sea." 

This  God-consciousness  is  quite  as  cha- 
racteristic of  the  New  Testament,  the  only 
difference  being  that  it  is  now  God  in  Christ, 
or  "the  Lord  the  Spirit,"  so  that  the  God- 
consciousness  passes  into  the  Christ-con- 
sciousness, which  is  so  all-pervading  in  the 
writings  of  the  Apostles  that  we  have  no 
sense  of  extravagance  when  the  chief  of 
them  says,  "To  me  to  live  is  Christ,"  and 
again,  "  Christ  is  all  and  in  all." 

Verily,  this  Bible  is  the  word — of  God. 

II.  The  Passion  for  Righteousness. 

It  may  be  said  indeed  that  every  one 
recognizes  this  feature  as  a  unique  character- 
istic of  the  Bible,  especially  since  the  time 
when  the  thought  was  so  eloquently  set  forth 
by  Matthew  Arnold  more  than  twenty  years 
ago.  I  cannot  therefore  do  better  than  quote 
a  passage  from  his  chapter  on  "the  greatness 
of  the  Old  Testament " :  "  The  whole  history 
of  the  world  to  this  day  is  in  truth  one  con- 
tinual   establishing   of  the    Old   Testament 


PASSION   FOR  RIGHTEOUSNESS  53 

revelation  :  *  O  ye  that  love  the  Eternal, 
see  that  ye  hate  the  thing  that  is  evil !  to 
him  that  ordereth  his  conversation  aright, 
shall  be  shown  the  salvation  of  God.'  And 
whether  we  consider  this  revelation  in 
respect  to  human  affairs  at  large,  or  in 
respect  to  individual  happiness,  in  either 
case  its  importance  is  so  immense,  that  the 
people  to  whom  it  was  given,  and  whose 
record  is  in  the  Bible,  deserve  fully  to  be 
singled  out  as  the  Bible  singles  them. 
'Behold  darkness  doth  cover  the  earth,  and 
gross  darkness  the  nations ;  but  the  Eternal 
shall  rise  upon  thee,  and  His  glory  shall  be 
seen  upon  thee !  *  For,  while  other  nations 
had  the  misleading  idea  that  this  or  that, 
other  than  righteousness,  is  saving,  and  it  is 
not ;  that  this  or  that,  other  than  conduct, 
brings  happiness,  and  it  does  not ;  Israel 
had  the  true  idea  that  righteousness  is 
saving,  that  to  conduct  belongs  happiness. 

"  Nor  let  it  be  said  that  other  nations,  too, 
had  at  least  something  of  this  idea.  They 
had,  but  they  were  xioX.  possessed  v^\\h  it ;  and 
to  feel  it  enough  to  make  the  whole  world 
feel  it,  it  was  necessary  to  be  possessed  with 
it.  It  is  not  sufficient  to  have  been  visited 
by  such  an  idea  at  times,  to   have   had   it 


54  A  PROPHET   NATION 

forced  occasionally  on  one's  mind  by  the 
teaching  of  experience.  No  ;  *  He  that  hath 
the  bride  is  the  bridegroom  ;  the  idea 
belongs  to  him  who  has  most  loved  it.  .  .  . 
Thy  testimonies  have  I  claimed  as  mine 
heritage  for  ever,  and  why?  they  are  the 
very  joy  of  my  heart ! '  This  is  why  the 
testimonies  of  righteousness  are  Israel's 
heritage  for  ever,  because  they  were  the 
very  joy  of  his  heart.  Herein  Israel  stood 
alone,  the  friend  and  elect  of  the  Eternal. 
'  He  showeth  His  word  unto  Jacob,  His 
statutes  and  ordinances  unto  Israel.  He 
hath  not  dealt  so  with  any  nation,  neither 
have  the  heathen  knowledge  of  His  laws.'  " 

In  the  heart  of  the  passion  for  righteous- 
ness is  the  great  ethical  conception  of  the 
divine  holiness,  which  again  is  specially 
characteristic  of  the  prophet  nation,  called 
first  to  discover,  and  then  to  proclaim,  that 
*'  Holy,  holy,  holy,  is  the  Lord  God  of 
Hosts."  The  absolute  holiness  of  God  is 
so  familiar  a  thought  to  us  now  that  we 
do  not  often  realize  its  greatness.  We  take 
it  as  a  matter  of  course  that  the  God  whom 
we  worship  should  be  absolutely  holy,  for- 
getting that  we  owe  to  the  prophet  nation 
our  realization  of  this  truth.     Compare  with 


PASSION   FOR  RIGHTEOUSNESS  55 

Israel  ancient  Greece  and  Rome.  See  in 
Greece  the  finest  art,  the  noblest  literature, 
the  sublimest  philosophy,  the  rnost  heroic 
patriotism — in  a  word,  the  highest  and 
most  perfect  culture.  And  of  all  this  Rome 
served  herself  heir,  and  added  great  national 
qualities  which  made  her  in  course  of  time 
the  mistress  of  the  world  and  its  metropolis 
for  more  than  a  thousand  years,  laying  broad 
and  deep  the  foundations  of  the  great  science 
and  system  of  law,  which  comes  nearest  of 
all  subjects  of  human  thought  to  the  science 
of  religion  itself.  What  might  we  not 
expect  then  of  a  religion  nurtured  in  Greece, 
and  fully  developed  in  Rome  .-*  Yet  despite 
the  art  and  literature  and  philosophy  of 
Greece,  and  the  civic  and  national,  political 
and  legislative  greatness  of  Rome,  the  re- 
ligion which  was  nurtured  and  developed 
under  these  influences  is  "  of  the  earth 
earthy,"  sadly  stained  all  through  by  the 
evil  imaginations  of  the  heart  of  man. 
Philosophy  and  letters  did  their  best  for 
it,  but  could  not  hide  its  shame.  As  for 
holiness,  the  conception  is  not  to  be  found. 
Their  gods  and  goddesses  were  just  as 
ready  to  patronize  the  vices  as  the  virtues. 
They  had    their    god    of   wine,    in  whose 


56  A  PROPHET  NATION 

honour  degrading  revels  might  with  pro- 
priety be  indulged.  They  had  their  goddess 
of  lust,  who  presided  over  sins  that  cannot  be 
described.  They  had  their  god  of  thieves. 
And  Jupiter  himself,  **  Optinms  Maximus,'* 
their  greatest  and  their  best,  was  believed 
by  the  majority  of  his  worshippers  to  be 
guilty  of  the  most  horrid  crimes. 

What  a  contrast  we  find  to  all  this  in 
the  Bible  !  There  we  have  the  history 
of  a  people  that  grew  up  side  by  side 
with  the  great  nations  of  the  ancient 
world — Egypt,  Assyria,  Babylon,  Greece, 
Rome,  a  poor  despised  people,  without  art, 
without  science,  without  philosophy,  with 
little  culture,  with  much  weakness  and  cor- 
ruption in  the  state  and  in  society — a  nation 
of  slaves  to  begin  with,  and  not  much  better 
in  the  end — made  to  pass  under  the  yoke 
of  Babylon,  made  to  pass  under  the  yoke 
of  Syria,  made  to  pass  under  the  yoke  of 
Rome,  and  finally  scattered  abroad,  a  by- 
word among  the  nations — and  yet  there  and 
thence,  out  of  that  so  unpromising  history, 
there  springs  up  a  conception  of  God  which 
is  to  that  of  Greece  and  Rome  as  light  is  to 
darkness.  The  religion  is  not  like  the  people 
at  all.     It  is  infinitely  above  them.    And  the 


LOFTY  SPIRITUALITY  57 

superiority  appears  especially  in  this,  that  in 
their  lowest  declension — moral,  intellectual, 
national — remained  like  adamant  this  great 
truth  :  "  The  Lord  our  God  is  holy."  There 
is  only  one  explanation.  In  the  great 
nations  the  religions  came  from  the  people 
and  were  like  them.  In  the  little  nation  the 
religion  came  from  God  and  was  like  Him. 
The  nation  was  a  prophet  nation. 

This  prepares  the  way  for  the  third 
characteristic  to  be  noticed. 

III.  Lofty  Spirituality. 

This  we  certainly  do  not  claim  for  them 
in  the  early  stages  of  their  history.  As  one 
of  their  own  prophets  put  it :  "  Thy  birth 
and  thy  nativity  is  of  the  Land  of  Canaan  ; 
thy  father  was  an  Amorite,  and  thy  mother 
a  Hittite"  (Ezekiel  xvi.  3).  And  as  their 
origin,  so  their  early  history.  It  would  be 
difficult  to  find  in  the  history  of  any  other 
nation  a  period  of  more  hopeless  savagery 
than  that  so  faithfully  described  in  the  Book 
of  Judges.  If  it  be  maintained  that  the 
Hebrews  had  a  natural  genius  for  religion, 
it  will  scarcely  be  claimed  for  them  that 
spirituality  was  an  original  characteristic 
of  the  nation.      But  this   makes   it  all  the 


58  A  PROPHET   NATION 

more  remarkable  that  their  literature  should 
gradually  become  more  and  more  spiritual, 
till  at  last  it  reached  heights  which  have 
never  been  surpassed. 

The  greatness  of  Israel  is  of  the  spirit 
only.  In  all  that  is  outward  and  material 
it  is  hopelessly  out  of  rank  with  the  other 
nations  of  the  ancient  world.  This  is  most 
impressive  to  the  traveller  who  passes 
through  Egypt  on  his  way  to  Palestine. 

**  Those  temples,  palaces,  and  piles  stupendous, 
Of  which  the  very  ruins  are  tremendous," 

speak  eloquently  of  Egypt's  greatness  in 
the  brave  days  of  old.  How  changed  the 
scene  when  he  passes  into  Palestine !  There 
indeed  he  sees  the  relics  of  a  bygone  age  ; 
but  what  a  contrast !  Little  or  nothing  to 
impress  the  thought  of  Israel's  greatness. 
There  are  some  great  remains,  such  as  the 
Tower  of  Herod  in  Jerusalem,  the  ruins 
of  Sebaste,  the  broken  columns  of  fallen 
Tyre ;  but  these  are  all  foreign — they  are 
Roman  and  Phoenician,  not  Hebrew.  Even 
Solomon's  temple  itself  was  built  by  Phoeni- 
cian workmen,  and  the  great  stones  in  the 
old  wall  of  Jerusalem  have  less  to  tell  than 
at  first  might  be  supposed  of  the  might  of 


LOFTY  SPIRITUALITY  59 

Israel.  At  most  they  tell  of  a  very  short 
period  during  which  alone  it  might  fairly 
be  said  that  Israel  was  great  among  the 
nations  of  the  earth.  And  the  country 
itself — how  disappointing  to  many !  No 
great  river  like  the  majestic  Nile  ;  no  great 
mountains  like  the  mighty  Alps  ;  not  even 
matchless  scenery  like  the  Western  High- 
lands of  Scotland,  or  the  sylvan  beauty  of 
many  an  English  shire.  Small  and  poor,  and 
unimpressive ;  and,  therefore,  necessarily 
disappointing  to  those  who  will  forget  that 
it  is  "  the  Holy  Land,"  and  not  '*  the  great 
and  mighty  land  "  they  go  to  see.  A  goodly 
land  and  large  it  was  for  a  little  time,  and 
might  have  been  always ;  but  follow  the 
course  of  its  actual  history,  and  it  cannot 
be  denied  that  it  is  in  the  main  the  history 
of  a  small  and  poor  country,  and  of  an  in- 
considerable and  by  no  means  great  people. 
But  what  does  all  this  mean  ?  It  means 
that  Israel's  greatness  is  of  the  spirit  only. 
*'  Not  by  might  nor  by  power,  but  by  My 
Spirit,  saith  the  Lord." 

One  thinks  in  this  connection  of  the 
remarkable  passage  in  Psalm  Ixviii.,  in  which 
there  is  the  suggestion  of  the  lofty  hills  of 
Bashan  looking  askance  at  the  little  hill  of 


6o  A  PROPHET  NATION 

Zion.  As  the  traveller  proceeds  northward 
from  Jerusalem,  the  hills  get  larger  and 
higher,  until,  as  he  reaches  the  Plain  of 
Esdraelon  and  looks  eastward,  he  sees  the 
giant  ridge  of  Bashan  looking  proudly  down 
on  little  Tabor  beside  him,  and  even  more 
proudly,  one  may  well  suppose,  on  the  still 
smaller  mount  in  the  south,  of  which  all  the 
world  speaks  and  hears.  **  Why  look  ye 
askance  (R.V.),  ye  high  hills  ?  "  "  The  hill 
of  God  is  as  the  hill  of  Bashan ;  an  high 
hill  as  the  hill  of  Bashan."  Zion  as  high 
as  Bashan  !  Take  a  foot-line  and  measure, 
says  the  pedantic  literalist.  Another  gross 
Bible  error.  But,  friend,  is  the  linear 
measure  the  only  measure  you  know  ?  Read 
on  :  "  This  is  the  hill  which  God  desireth 
to  dwell  in."  It  is  spiritual  altitude  of  which 
the  Psalmist  is  thinking.  And  here  even 
the  Alps  are  small  in  comparison.  The 
matter-of-fact  tourist,  fresh  from  the  glories 
of  the  Bernese  Oberland  and  the  wild 
grandeur  of  Chamounix  and  Zermatt,  may 
say,  **  How  paltry  are  these  little  hills  of 
Palestine,  and  how  foolish  to  make  so  much 
of  them !  Here  we  are  in  front  of  the  most 
famous  mountain  in  all  the  world,  and  it  is 
not  half  so  high  as  Snowdon."     Why  look 


LOFTY  SPIRITUALITY  61 

ye  askance  ?  "  This  is  the  hill  which  God 
desireth  to  dwell  in."  It  is  not  its  height 
above  the  sea-level ;  it  is  not  its  beauty  or 
grandeur;  it  is  not  anything  that  earth  can 
do,  or  has  done  for  it,  that  makes  it  so 
much  worth  looking  at — it  is  that  here  God 
revealed  Himself  to  men,  and  this  exalts 
it,  exalts  it  to  the  height  of  Alps  or  Andes 
or  Himalayas.  "The  hill  of  God  is  as  the 
hill  of  Bashan  ;  an  high  hill  as  the  hill  of 
Bashan!" 

"  Can  any  good  thing  come  out  of 
Nazareth  ? "  No  question  could  be  mo-re 
pertinent  or  sensible  on  the  standing  ground 
of  mere  earthly  evolution ;  and  it  is  still 
appropriate  as  applied  to  the  whole  of 
Palestine.  Those  who  visit  Palestine  in 
the  expectation  of  finding  in  the  land  itself, 
its  soil,  scenery,  people,  and  surroundings, 
a  sufficient  explanation,  on  principles  of 
mere  natural  development,  of  the  wonders 
that  have  come  out  of  it,  are,  of  course, 
grievously  disappointed — "  disillusioned,"  as 
it  is  the  fashion  to  say.  But  ought  those 
to  be  disappointed  who  have  no  expectation 
of  finding  the  wonders  of  divine  truth  and 
love  so  easily  explained  ?  The  man  of 
spiritual  discernment  knows  that   the  good 


62  A  PROPHET  NATION 

thing  in  all  the  world's  history,  the  un- 
speakable gift  of  God  to  men,  did  not  come 
out  of  Nazareth  ;  and  when  he  visits  the 
Holy  Land,  and  finds  it  no  better  than  othe. 
lands,  and  in  many  important  respects  far 
inferior  to  the  more  favoured  lands  of  the 
West,  he  is  only  confirmed  in  his  belief  that 
the  heritage  of  truth,  which  has  come  down 
to  us  from  ancient  Israel,  did  not  come  from 
the  land,  or  from  the  people,  but  that  in 
very  deed  it  has  come  to  us  out  of  heaven 
from  God. 

In  all  this,  be  it  remembered,  there  is  no 
question  of  detail.  It  is  not  whether  this, 
that,  or  the  other  verse  or  book  of  the  Bible 
is  inspired ;  it  is  not  even  whether  this  or 
that  particular  prophet  or  psalmist  can  ex- 
hibit his  divine  commission.  It  is  the  whole 
course  and  progress  of  the  history,  and  the 
literature  which  springs  up  like  trees  by  the 
watercourses  of  divine  love  and  grace.  On 
the  one  hand  we  find  a  poor,  comparatively 
ignorant,  and  very  fickle  and  feeble  people, 
with  a  history  which  does  them  very  little 
credit,  which  rises  into  greatness  only  for  a 
very  brief  period,  and  for  the  most  part  is  a 
record  of  sin  and  disgrace  and  disaster  ;  and 
yet,  notwithstanding  all  this,  it  is  a  nation 


ITS   PULPIT  63 

whose  sons  have  reached  heights  of  vision 
which  no  others  have  attained — even  Greece 
itself,  so  immeasurably  above  them  in  all 
that  earth  can  do  to  raise  men,  not  to  be 
compared  —  heights  of  spiritual  vision  as 
high  above  even  their  Platos  and  Zenos, 
as  their  snow-clad  Parnassus  towers  above 
Israel's  little  Hill  of  Zion.  And  it  was  no 
mere  burst  of  development  in  a  golden  age 
like  that  of  Pericles  ;  it  was  a  steady  light, 
shining  on  and  on  and  on,  through  darkest 
days  and  stormiest  weather,  even  getting 
brighter  and  clearer  in  the  days  of  national 
decline,  and  shining  out  in  its  fullest  bril- 
liancy in  the  age  of  the  nation's  utter  fall 
and  ruin,  when  out  of  the  ashes  of  the  holy 
nation's  death  there  rises  the  Sun  of  Right- 
eousness, the  Holy  One  of  Israel,  to  illumine 
all  the  world.  The  prophet  nation  passes, 
the  Prophet  of  humanity  abides. 

IV.  The  Nation's  Pulpit. 

Consider,  In  concluding  this  most  important 
branch  of  our  subject,  that  though  the  Holy 
Land  was  so  very  small,  it  provided  a  very 
good  pulpit  for  the  prophet  nation.  It  has 
often  been  objected  that  it  is  not  reasonable 
to   suppose    that    if    God    were   to    reveal 


64  A  PROPHET  NATION 

Himself  at  all,  He  would  do  it  in  so  small  and 
out-of-the-way  a  corner  of  the  earth  as  little 
Palestine.  But  is  the  Bible  only  a  Palestine 
book  ?  And  was  Palestine  a  corner  of  the 
earth  ?  Not  so.  The  Bible  bears  in  it  the 
burden  of  all  the  world.  There  is  no  great 
nation  of  antiquity  that  has  not  its  place 
there.  And  though  Palestine  itself  was 
small,  it  was  in  no  corner ;  on  the  contrary 
it  was  right  in  the  centre  of  the  world 
which  then  was — south  of  it  was  Egypt ; 
east,  Babylon ;  north-east,  Assyria ;  north, 
Tyre,  Sidon,  Syria  ;  and  west,  Greece  and 
Rome.  Take  Jerusalem  as  your  centre, 
and  with  a  radius  of  twelve  degrees  lati- 
tude describe  a  circle,  and  you  will  include 
the  capitals  of  all  the  kingdoms  which 
figured  in  the  main  current  of  the  world's 
history  up  to  the  time  of  Alexander  the 
Great ;  and  there  is  no  other  capital  of 
which  this  can  be  said ;  and  when  after- 
wards, first  the  conquests  of  Alexander, 
and  later  those  of  Rome,  quite  altered 
the  ancient  balance  of  power,  though  both 
the  capitals  of  the  West  were  beyond  the 
twelve  degrees  of  distance,  yet  even  these 
western  empires  might  be  regarded  as 
neighbouring   powers,    for   it    was    a    mere 


ITS  PULPIT  6s 

stretch  of  sea  that  lay  between  :  in  sailing 
westward  to  the  coasts  of  Europe,  the  first 
land  reached  was  Greece  and  the  next  was 
Italy. 

The  world,  of  course,  was  not  nearly  so 
large  In  ancient  times  as  It  is  now;  but 
such  as  it  was,  the  Holy  Land  was  in  the 
centre  of  it.  If  we  think  of  it  we  shall 
see  that  it  would  have  been  impossible  to 
have  chosen  a  more  central  position.  That 
rocky  ridge  lifted  up  above  the  great  river- 
plains  around,  where  grew  and  flourished 
the  mighty  empires  of  antiquity,  was  a 
magnificent  rostrum  from  which  to  reach 
them  all  with  the  word  of  God  ;  and  well 
might  the  Hebrew  prophets  lift  up  their 
voices  to  the  nations  far  and  near  with 
such  a  cry  as  this  :  **  O  earth,  earth,  earth, 
hear  the  word  of  the  Lord,"  or  this :  **  Hear 
ye  people,  all  of  you,  hearken,  O  earth,  and 
all  that  therein  is ;  and  let  the  Lord  God 
be  witness  against  you,  the  Lord  from  His 
holy  temple."  All  the  great  nations  had 
their  great  witnesses,  and  all  at  the  time 
of  the  zenith  of  their  power:  there  was 
Abraham  in  old  Chaldea;  Joseph,  Moses, 
in  Egypt ;  Jonah  in  Nineveh ;  Ezekiel, 
Daniel,  in  Babylon ;  and  of  the  great  empire 

F 


66  A   PROPHET  NATION 

of  Persia,  the  last  of  the  great  eastern 
powers,  the  founder  himself  was  the  chosen 
of  the  Lord  to  set  His  people  free.  Was 
not  that  most  true  which  God  gave  by  the 
mouth  of  His  prophet :  "  I  have  not  spoken 
in  secret,  in  a  dark  place  of  the  earth  "  ;  and 
that  grand  utterance  of  the  Psalmist :  "  The 
mighty  God,  even  the  Lord,  hath  spoken, 
and  called  the  earth,  from  the  rising  of  the 
sun  to  the  going  down  thereof.  Out  of 
Zion,  the  perfection  of  beauty,  God  hath 
shined  "  ?  Yes,  Jerusalem  was  indeed  a  city 
set  on  a  hill  that  could  not  be  hid.  It  was 
the  best  place  in  all  the  world  from  which 
to  send  out  light  and  truth  that  they  might 
be  guides  to  men  and  bring  them  to  God's 
holy  hill,  where  His  dwelling  was  ;  and,  as 
the  slow  course  of  history  has  proved,  that 
was  no  Utopia  which  was  in  the  Psalmist's 
outlook  when  he  prayed,  **  God  be  merciful 
to  us  and  bless  us,  and  cause  His  face  to 
shine  upon  us,  that  Thy  way  may  be  known 
upon  earth,  Thy  saving  health  among  all 
nations." 

To  sum  up,  Israel  was  a  prophet  nation 
called  of  God  to  proclaim  His  message  of 
salvation  to  the  whole  world ;   and  in  this 


A  PROPHET   NATION  67 

unquestionable  fact  we  have  a  broad  and 
deep  foundation  for  our  faith  in  the  inspira- 
tion and  authority  of  the  Hbrary  of  sacred 
literature  in  which  the  story  of  the  nation  is 
enshrined  and  their  oracles  are  preserved. 

Note. — If  we  are  reminded  that  there  are  two  books  of 
the  Old  Testament  (Esther  and  Song  of  Solomon)  in  which  the 
name  of  God  is  not  once  mentioned,  we  might  speak  of  the 
exception  proving  the  rule  ;  but  it  is  more  to  the  purpose  to 
remind  ourselves  that  both  these  are  among  the  "deutero- 
canonical "  books,  for  which,  therefore,  there  is  no  necessity 
of  holding  ourselves  specially  responsible.  Moreover,  such 
is  the  influence  of  all  the  other  Scriptures  which  surround 
them,  that  though  the  divine  name  is  not  mentioned  in 
cither,  it  has  been  the  habit  of  people  always  to  read  the 
providence  of  God  into  the  one  and  the  love  of  God  into  the 
other. 


CHAPTER  V 
Divine  Discipline  through  a  Long  History 

IT  is  a  great  mistake  to  suppose  that  the 
giving  of  divine  revelation  was  a  very- 
simple  thing.  Many  seem  to  think  that 
nothing  more  was  necessary  than  putting 
into  words  what  was  needful  for  man  to 
know.  Place  in  his  hands  a  book  telling 
all  that  needs  to  be  told,  with  the  assurance 
that  every  word  of  it  is  straight  from  God, 
and  the  thing  is  done.  These  people  forget 
or  fail  to  realize  that — 

"...  It  is  by  no  breath, 
Turn  of  eye,  wave  of  hand,  that  salvation  joins  issue  with 
death." 

Words  certainly  were  needed,  but  deeds 
much  more  ;  teaching  was  needed,  but  train- 
ing much  more.  A  nation  cannot  be  a 
prophet  nation  without  divine  discipline. 

The  need  of  discipline   is  apparent  even 
in  intellectual  equipment.     You  cannot  put 

68 


DIVINE   DISCIPLINE  69 

a  book  on  the  higher  mathematics  into  the 
hand  of  a  tyro;  and  he  who  would  master 
any  difficult  subject  must  not  only  read  and 
listen,  but  must  toil  and  strive,  pass  through 
a  course  of  discipline — at  the  hands  of  a 
master  in  childhood  and  at  his  own  hands  in 
later  life.  And  while  discipline  is  necessary 
for  proficiency  in  any  curriculum,  it  is  espe- 
cially necessary  where  not  only  the  mind 
but  the  heart  must  be  developed,  where 
character  is  the  supreme  achievement.  It 
was  not  enough,  therefore,  that  God  should 
speak  to  the  fathers  by  the  prophets,  it  was 
necessary  that  He  should  do  great  things  for 
them,  while  passing  them  through  a  course 
of  discipline  by  which  they  should  be  pre- 
pared to  be  the  prophet  nation  of  the  world. 
It  is  for  this  reason  that  the  sacred  Scriptures 
are  in  the  main  historical,  setting  forth  what 
the  Lord  did  for  His  people,  and  how  He 
led  them  and  guided  them,  tried  and  proved 
them,  suffered  them  to  fall  and  raised  them 
up  again.  The  Scriptures  are  full  of  this, 
but  perhaps  it  is  nowhere  more  tenderly 
expressed  than  in  that  beautiful  passage  in 
Deuteronomy  :  "  As  an  eagle  stirreth  up  her 
nest,  fluttereth  over  her  young,  spreadeth 
abroad  her  wings,  taketh  them,  beareth  them 


70  DIVINE  DISCIPLINE 

on  her  wings  :  so  the  Lord  alone  did  lead 
them,  and  there  was  no  strange  god  with 
Him." 

In  the  work  of  creation  it  was  only  neces- 
sary for  God  to  say,  "  Let  there  be  light," 
and  there  was  light.  But  with  God  a  word 
is  a  deed.  In  the  work  of  creation  there 
was  but  one  will  to  act,  so  a  fiat  was  all. 
But  in  the  far  greater  work  of  redemption 
there  was  the  will  of  man  to  reckon  with, 
as  well  as  the  will  of  God.  There  were  two 
parties  to  the  transaction  ;  and  though  One 
was  omnipotent,  and  the  other  feeble  and 
helpless,  yet  the  will  of  the  feeble  and  help- 
less one  must  not  be  crushed  and  overborne. 
He  must  not  be  coerced  into  a  mechanical 
holiness,  such  as  Huxley  in  one  of  his  weaker 
moments  craved ;  he  must  be  led  into  a  will- 
ing obedience  and  service.  This  required 
time — long  time  ;  and  patience — very  much 
patience — on  the  part  of  God.  Hence  the 
long  discipline  of  the  prophet  nation. 

It  is  because  there  were  two  parties  in 
the  whole  process  of  revelation  that  we  hear 
so  much  of  "the  Covenant" — the  Covenant 
with  Abraham  and  his  seed,  the  Covenant 
with  Moses  and  the  children  of  Israel.  What 
did  this  mean  but  that  God  could  not  act 


DIVINE   DISCIPLINE  71 

alone,  He  must  do  everything  in  co-opera- 
tion with  the  people  ?  The  difficulties  which 
caused  so  much  delay  were  never  with  Him, 
always  with  them ;  and  the  reason  why  the 
light  came  only  by  degrees  was  not  because 
God  grudged  any  more  of  it,  but  because  it 
was  all  they  could  bear  at  the  time.  When 
the  Lord  Jesus  said  to  His  disciples  on  the 
eve  of  His  crucifixion,  "  I  have  many  things 
to  say  unto  you,  but  ye  cannot  bear  them 
now,"  He  disclosed  the  whole  method  of  the 
divine  procedure  in  the  giving  of  revelation. 
Not  only  is  it  true  that  the  people  had 
to  be  prepared  by  a  divine  discipline  for 
receiving  the  revelation  of  God,  but  the 
revelation  itself  was  far  less  in  word  than  in 
deed.  Character  is  far  more  fully  and  im- 
pressively revealed  by  action  than  by  speech. 
Suppose  that  from  the  starry  sky  to  which 
Abraham  looked  up  there  had  come  a  voice, 
"  God  is  love,"  or  that  on  it  the  words  had 
been  written  in  letters  of  light,  could  he 
have  understood  it  .'*  Could  the  three  words 
possibly  have  meant  to  him  what  they  meant 
centuries  later  to  St.  John,  when,  after  the 
long  discipline  of  Israel  the  record  of  which 
he  had  so  often  read,  after  three  years*  com- 
panionship with  the  Christ  of  God,  and  many 


72  DIVINE   DISCIPLINE 

years  thereafter  of  meditating  upon  all  that 
he  had  learned  from  God's  doings  to  Israel 
and  in  His  Son,  the  great  truth  grew  into 
a  sun  lightening  all  his  firmament  ? 

This  great  fact  that  God  revealed  Himself 
in  deeds  is  written  large  through  the  whole 
of  the  Scriptures.  God  spoke  to  Abraham, 
Isaac,  and  Jacob ;  but  if  we  gather  together 
all  the  spoken  words,  sublime  though  they 
be,  they  are  very  few  in  number.  But 
His  greatest  utterances  were  always  deeds. 
Think  what  He  did  for  Abraham,  Isaac,  and 
Jacob.  Think  what  He  did  for  Joseph  and 
through  Joseph.  Think  what  He  did  for 
Moses  and  through  Moses.  Think  what  He 
did  through  Joshua  and  the  Judges,  and  the 
Kings.  Read  the  historical  psalms,  and  see 
the  psalmists  rejoicing  in  the  mighty  deeds 
of  old ;  hear  the  prophets  continually  remind- 
ing the  people  of  them ;  and,  in  the  perfect 
revelation  which  came  at  last  through  the 
Holy  One  of  Israel,  mark  how  the  deeds 
were  the  main  substance  of  it :  "  Go  your 
way,  and  tell  John  what  things  ye  have  seen 
and  heard  ;  how  that  the  blind  see,  the  lame 
walk,  the  lepers  are  cleansed,  the  deaf  hear, 
the  dead  are  raised,  to  the  poor  the  gospel 
is  preached  " ;  the  preaching  of  the  gospel 


DIVINE   DISCIPLINE  73 

coming  last,  not  because  it  is  least  important, 
but  because  it  is  the  deeds  which  make  it 
plain  that  there  is  a  gospel  to  preach. 

Thus  it  was  that  the  children  of  Israel 
grew  into  the  knowledge  of  God,  getting 
ever  clearer  and  fuller  revelations  of  His 
unity  and  personality,  His  might,  His  holi- 
ness, His  justice,  His  tenderness.  His  mercy, 
His  forgiveness,  His  love.  The  revelation 
was  both  in  word  and  in  deed,  but  the  revela- 
tion in  deed  was  the  more  important  and  the 
more  influential.  In  fact,  many  of  the  words 
were  to  call  attention  to  the  deeds,  and  to 
teach  the  lessons  to  be  learned  from  them. 
The  revelation,  then,  was  progressive  through 
a  long  process  of  divine  discipline,  by  which 
the  prophetic  function  of  the  nation  was 
developed. 

Here  again  the  revelation  is  unique.  We 
would  not  forget,  indeed,  that  all  the  nations 
were  under  divine  discipline,  and  that  in 
this  point  of  view  the  history  of  Israel  is  a 
key  to  the  history  of  the  world,  which  is 
just  another  way  of  saying  that  Israel  was 
a  prophet  nation,  not  only  as  proclaiming 
the  salvation  of  God,  but  also  as  showing  the 
hand  of  God  in  history.  But  the  uniqueness 
of  Israel's  position  was  this,  that  of  no  other 


74  DIVINE   DISCIPLINE 

nation  can  it  be  said  that  it  was  especially 
trained  to  receive  and  convey  to  others  the 
revelation  of  God. 

Let  it  be  noticed  also  that  in  this  historical 
process  of  revelation  we  have  not  only  relief 
from  the  most  serious  difficulties  attaching 
to  the  view  of  verbal  inspiration  equally  dis- 
tributed through  all  the  books,  but  also  a 
strong  and  most  striking  confirmation  of  our 
faith  in  the  divine  inspiration  of  the  Bible  as 
a  whole.  Think  how  the  revelation  of  God 
through  the  discipline  of  the  prophet  nation 
has  been  inextricably  interwoven  with  the 
world's  history.  Our  faith  is  not  a  system 
of  doctrines  or  dogmas,  speculations  of  men's 
minds.  All  the  principal  teachings  of  the 
Bible  are  bound  up  with  great  facts  in  history  ; 
they  are  not,  like  the  philosophy  of  the  best 
of  the  Greeks,  or  the  ethics  of  Confucius,  or 
the  original  parts  of  the  Koran,  the  mere 
product  of  some  superior  or  peculiar  mind, 
exercising  its  powers  as  best  it  may  on  the 
problems  of  life  and  destiny ;  nor  like  the 
mythology  of  the  heathen,  founded  entirely  on 
prehistoric  fable ;  but  are  so  connected  with 
great  outstanding  facts  in  the  world's  history 
which  no  one  can  possibly  deny,  that  a  firm 
basis  is  afforded  for  an  intelligent  faith. 


DIVINE   DISCIPLINE  75 

We  saw  in  our  last  chapter  how  the  history 
of  Israel  in  comparison  with,  or  rather  in 
contrast  to,  that  of  the  great  nations  all  round 
about  it,  brought  out  the  force  of  the  pro- 
phetic word  :  "  Not  by  might,  nor  by  power, 
but  by  My  Spirit,  saith  the  Lord."  Consider 
now  how  the  contact  of  Israel  with  other 
nations  throughout  the  whole  of  its  history 
gives  opportunity  for  those  confirmations 
which  come  in  ever-increasing  numbers  from 
ancient  monuments,  inscriptions,  and  histori- 
cal records.  Even  as  far  back  a^  Abraham 
we  have  illustrations  and  confirmations  of 
the  Bible  story — as,  for  example,  in  the  war 
of  the  four  kings  with  five  recorded  in  the 
fourteenth  chapter  of  Genesis.  As  we  come 
down,  the  points  of  contact  and  confirmations 
are  more  and  more  numerous  and  impressive. 
The  history  of  Egypt  affords  many  of  these, 
from  the  time  of  Joseph  onwards.  As 
perhaps  the  best  illustration  of  this,  we  may 
refer  to  the  Exodus  in  connection  with  the 
contemporary  history  of  Egypt  as  gathered 
from  the  monuments  and  the  records  of 
that  mighty  nation.  From  these  it  has 
been  determined  that  the  time  of  Rameses 
the  Great  was  the  very  culmination  of  the 
Egyptian    power  and    glory.      Of    all    the 


76  DIVINE  DISCIPLINE 

mighty  monarchs  he  was  the  mightiest ; 
and  yet  it  was  in  his  time  that  Moses  was 
called  out  from  among  the  Hebrew  slaves 
and  trained  for  his  great  mission  ;  and  it 
was  when  the  unparalleled  achievements 
of  this  mightiest  monarch  of  all  had  been 
finished,  and  the  fruits  of  his  victories 
gathered,  when  the  land  had  been  filled 
with  monuments  of  his  mighty  deeds,  and 
the  prestige  of  the  great  empire  was  at  its 
height — it  was  then,  that  to  his  haughty 
and  stubborn  son  and  successor,  from  the 
mouth  of  one  of  his  slaves  there  came  the 
peremptory  word  :  "  Let  My  people  go." 

When  all  this  is  set  vividly  before  the  mind, 
what  majesty  does  one  see  in  that  magnificent 
opening  of  the  Sinai  revelation  :  "  I  am  the 
Lord  thy  God,  which  have  brought  thee  out 
of  the  land  of  Egypt,  out  of  the  house  of 
bondage  " !  And  how  thoroughly  we  enter 
into  the  conviction  of  the  people  themselves 
when  they  say  :  "  The  Lord  brought  us  forth 
out  of  the  land  of  Egypt  with  a  mighty  hand 
and  with  an  outstretched  arm."  Verily  He 
did.  Who  that  thinks  can  doubt  it  ?  To 
say  that  these  poor  slaves  were  rescued  from 
such  bondage  and  transformed  into  a  free 
nation  by  any  powers  of  their  own,  or  any 


DIVINE  DISCIPLINE  77 

conceivable  process  of  the  development  of 
free  institutions,  is  to  speak  nonsense.  It  was 
not  evolution  ;  it  was  salvation.  Remember, 
it  is  no  question  of  details — of  flies,  or  lice, 
or  frogs.  Even  in  matters  of  detail  there  is 
confirmation,  as,  for  example,  in  the  remark- 
able discoveries  from  the  excavations  at 
Pithom  and  Raamses,  so  that  we  have  no 
reason  to  be  afraid  of  details ;  but  then  they 
are  distracting,  and  often  turn  away  attention 
from  the  great  outstanding  fact  which  is  of 
prime  importance — that  by  a  mighty  hand 
and  an  outstretched  arm  God  did  bring  His 
people  out  of  Egypt.  Thus  does  God  stand 
revealed  on  the  very  threshold  of  authentic 
and  continuous  history,  old  Egj'pt  and  its 
mighty  monuments  being  witnesses  to  Him 
as  the  God  of  Salvation.  Here  is  the 
way  that  Moses  put  it,  in  words  far  more 
enduring  than  the  pyramids,  for  they  are  as 
fresh  and  living  to-day  as  ever,  as  appro- 
priate now  as  then :  *'  The  Lord  is  my 
strength  and  my  song,  and  He  is  become 
my  salvation  ;  this  is  my  God,  and  I  will 
praise  Him,  my  father's  God,  and  I  will 
exalt  Him."  This  one  great  fact  of  ancient 
history  is  a  broad  and  deep  foundation,  not 
indeed  for  any  human  theory  of  inspiration, 


78  DIVINE   DISCIPLINE 

but   for   our    faith    in    God    as   mighty   to 
save. 

It  would  take  far  too  long  to  develop 
the  thought  through  the  subsequent  history. 
Suffice  it  to  say  that  the  divine  disciphne 
of  Israel  through  fourteen  centuries  is  so 
linked  with  the  history  of  the  world  as 
known  from  other  sources — with  the  histories 
of  Nineveh,  and  Babylon,  and  Persia,  and 
Greece,  and  Rome — that  the  Hebrew  Scrip- 
tures, notably  the  prophecies,  are  continually 
illumined  and  confirmed  by  what  we  know 
of  other  nations ;  so  that,  without  descend- 
ing to  matters  of  detail,  we  have  the  main 
lines  of  that  history  of  divine  discipline 
through  which  the  revelation  of  God  and 
of  His  salvation  has  come  to  us,  standing 
out  clear  and  sure  beyond  all  reach  of  ques- 
tion or  cavil.*' 

*  It  immediately  raises  not  only  cavil,  but  serious  ques- 
tions, when  arguments  such  as  these,  which  are  abundantly 
sufficient  to  prove  the  general  trustworthiness  of  Scripture, 
are  treated  as  if  they  were  equally  valid  for  establishing 
the  theory  of  minute  verbal  inspiration.  A  very  common 
practice  of  those  who  are  determined  at  all  hazards  to 
maintain  their  theory  is  to  assume  that  all  who  differ  from 
them  are  trying  to  prove  the  Scriptures  a  tissue  of  false- 
hood, in  which  case  all  the  witness  of  the  monuments  and 
of  the  historical  records  would  be  relevant  and  valid ;  but 
what  they  fail  to  recognize  is  that  all  these  happily  abundant 
confirmations  of  the  general   truth  of  the  sacred   records 


DIVINE  DISCIPLINE  79 

have  no  relevancy  as  bearing  on  the  question  between  the 
mechanical  and  the  spiritual  theories  of  inspiration.  And 
the  sad  result  often  is  that,  arguments  which  are  perfectly 
sound  and  sufficient  for  proving  the  trustworthiness  of  the 
sacred  writers  having  been  brought  forward  as  if  they  proved 
their  infallibility,  the  vice  of  the  wrong  application  of  the 
arguments  reacts  on  the  arguments  themselves  ;  and  people, 
clearly  seeing  that  they  certainly  do  not  prove  the  conclusion 
for  which  they  are  advanced,  infer  that  they  prove  nothing 
at  all. 


CHAPTER  VI 
The  Object   Lesson 

"  "NT  OW  all  these  things  happened  unto 
IN  them  for  ensamples;  and  they  are 
written  for  our  admonition,  upon  whom  the 
ends  of  the  world  are  come."  The  divine 
discipline  was  for  Israel  in  the  first  place, 
but  not  for  Israel  alone — it  was  for  all ; 
hence,  the  discipline  of  Israel,  with  the 
revelation  which  came  through  it,  has  been 
enshrined  in  the  sacred  Scriptures,  and 
handed  over  to  all  nations  that  they  may 
learn  Israel's  lessons  and  share  with  her 
the  great  revelation. 

We  must  at  this  point  make  clear  in  our 
minds  the  distinction  between  the  revelation 
and  the  record  of  it.  The  one  is  quite  apart 
from  the  other.  The  revelation  of  God 
through  Israel  and  in  Christ  would  have 
been  a  revelation  even  if  there  had  been 
no  record  of  it.     And  both  in  the  one  and 

80 


THE   OBJECT   LESSON  8i 

in  the  other — that  is,  both  in  the  Old  Testa- 
ment and  in  the  New — the  revelation  always 
comes  in  advance  of  the  record.  God 
revealed  Himself  to  Abraham,  Isaac,  and 
Jacob  long  before  the  story  of  the  patriarchs 
was  written  ;  He  revealed  Himself  through 
the  prophets  before  any  of  the  prophecies 
were  put  on  record;  He  revealed  Himself 
in  Christ  before  the  first  of  the  Epistles 
was  written,  and  long  before  Mark,  the  first 
of  our  Evangelists,  sat  down  to  write  the 
wondrous  story.  It  is  mere  confusion  of 
thought,  then,  to  make  no  distinction  be- 
tween God's  revelation  of  Himself — to  Israel, 
through  the  prophets,  and  in  Christ — and  the 
record  of  it  which  we  have  in  the  sacred 
Scriptures. 

This  raises  the  question  as  to  the  means 
taken  to  secure  a  trustworthy  record.  Such 
a  record  we  have,  but  we  cannot  discover 
any  sign  of  special  arrangements  having 
been  made  to  secure  it.  It  seems,  as  a 
rule  at  least,  to  have  been  left  to  what  we 
may  call  ordinary  providence.  God  was  in 
it,  of  course,  as  He  is  in  everything;  and 
most  thankful  should  we  be  that,  in  His 
adorable  providence,  He  put  it  into  the 
hearts  of  a  sufficient   number  of  competent 

G 


82  THE  OBJECT   LESSON 

persons  to  write  the  history  of  His  dealings 
with  Israel,  and  to  put  on  record  a  number 
of  the  special  messages  which  were  sent  to 
the  fathers  by  the  prophets,  as  well  as  to  set 
before  us  the  earthly  life  of  our  Lord,  and 
to  give  us  some  account  of  what  He  con- 
tinued to  do  and  to  teach  by  His  Spirit;  but 
there  is  no  sign  of  men  being  specially  called 
and  commissioned  to  undertake  the  work. 

We  read  of  the  call  of  Abraham  to  come 
out  and  be  separate,  and  become  the  founder 
of  a  nation ;  of  the  call  of  Moses  to  declare 
His  Name  to  the  people  and  bring  them  out 
of  Egypt ;  of  the  call  of  Gideon  and  others, 
in  the  time  of  the  Judges,  to  fight  the  Lord's 
battles ;  of  the  call  of  Samuel  and  many 
others,  his  successors,  to  be  His  prophets  to 
the  people ;  of  the  call  of  Saul,  and  after- 
wards of  David  and  his  successors,  to  be 
kings,  and  of  their  anointing  for  their  special 
work  :  but  we  have  no  sign  of  any  one  being 
specially  called  and  commissioned  to  write 
the  history  of  the  chosen  people.  If  any 
one  supposes,  for  example,  that  Samuel  was 
called,  not  only  to  be  a  prophet  and  judge  in 
Israel,  but  to  write  the  books  which  bear 
his  name,  they  have  only  to  observe  that  his 
death  is  recorded  in  the  first  book  (i  Samuel 


THE  OBJECT  LESSON  83 

XXV.  i),  and  that  the  rest  of  that  book,  and 
the  whole  of  the  second  volume,  tell  what 
happened  after  his  death ;  moreover,  the 
two  Books  of  Samuel  and  the  two  Books  of 
Kings  are  bound  in  one  volume  in  the 
Septuagint  (which,  be  it  remembered,  was 
the  Bible  chiefly  used  in  the  time  of  our 
Lord  and  His  Apostles),  with  no  indication 
whatever  as  to  who  was  the  author  of  any 
part  of  it.  Nor  have  we  any  means  of 
knowing  who  was  the  author  of  the  two 
Books  of  Chronicles,  or  of  the  earlier  Books 
of  Joshua,  Judges,  and  Ruth. 

Thus,  we  find  that  the  entire  history, 
from  the  entrance  into  Canaan  down  to  the 
Captivity,  a  space  of  seven  hundred  years  at 
least,  comes  to  us,  not  only  without  any  sign 
of  a  call  or  commission  to  perform  this 
important  service,  but  without  any  means 
of  finding  out  who  the  author  was.  This  is 
a  fact  which  is  surely  not  without  signi- 
ficance, and  which  ought  not  to  be  entirely 
disregarded,  as  it  so  often  is,  by  inquirers 
who  wish  to  be  humble  and  reverent.  We 
may  think  it  unfortunate  ;  but  why  should 
we  ?  At  all  events,  there  it  is ;  and  we 
ought  humbly  to  accept  it,  and  to  adapt  to 
it  our  theory  of  the  relative  importance  of 


84  THE  OBJECT  LESSON 

the  revelation  itself,  and  the  record  which 
enshrines  it.  Ezra  is  the  first  name  known 
after  the  time  of  Moses,  as  a  recorder  of  the 
Lord's  dealings  with  His  people.  It  is  pro- 
bable that  he  not  only  recorded  the  events 
of  his  own  time,  but  that  he  collected  and 
edited  the  histories  which  had  come  into 
his  hands  from  the  past.  Hence  we  know 
him  as  "  Ezra  the  Scribe  ";  yet  he  was  called 
first  and  mainly,  to  do  his  work  as  a  re- 
former in  Israel,  and  there  is  no  mention  of 
any  commission  to  take  in  hand  either  the 
recording  or  the  editing.  The  same  applies 
to  Nehemiah.  The  prophets  had  sometimes 
special  directions  to  write,  as  when  Jeremiah 
prepared  the  roll  which  Jehoiakim  destroyed, 
and  again,  by  divine  direction,  prepared  a 
second  roll ;  but  we  have  no  evidence  of  any 
special  call  or  commission  to  record  the 
prophecies  for  the  sake  of  the  ages  to  come. 
So,  in  the  New  Testament,  we  have  the 
call  of  Matthew  to  be  a  disciple,  and  a 
further  call  to  be  an  apostle ;  but  we  have  no 
record  of  any  call  or  commission  to  write  his 
gospel.  The  Evangelist  Luke  tells  us  how 
he  came  to  write  his,  and  not  only  is  there  no 
reference  to  any  special  call  or  commission, 
but  it  is  put  just  as  if  it  had  occurred    to 


THE   OBJECT   LESSON  85 

himself  to  do  it :  "  Forasmuch  as  many  have 
taken  in  hand  to  set  forth  in  order  a  de- 
claration of  those  things  which  are  most 
surely  believed  among  us,  even  as  they 
delivered  them  unto  us,  which  from  the  be- 
ginning were  eyewitnesses,  and  ministers  of 
the  word  ;  it  seemed  good  to  me  also,  ..." 
And  the  Acts  of  the  Apostles  comes  to  us 
in  the  same  apparently  incidental  way.  The 
Epistles,  too,  were  written  just  as  occasion 
offered,  for  the  use  of  the  Churches  to  which 
they  were  addressed,  and  without  any  in- 
dication that  the  author  felt  himself  called 
to  write  authoritatively  for  the  Church  uni- 
versal and  for  the  world  at  large.  Not  till 
we  come  to  the  last  book  is  there  anything 
which  looks  like  a  distinct  call  and  commis- 
sion to  write :  "  What  thou  seest,  write  in 
a  book." 

All  this  surely  shows  that,  important  as 
the  writing  of  the  record  was,  it  was  not 
at  all  on  the  same  level  with  the  work  of 
those  who  were  called  to  take  part  in  the 
revelation  itself,  or  were  sent  with  special 
messages  direct  from  God,  as  was  true  of 
the  prophets.  Most  certainly  God  was  in 
it  all,  guiding,  prompting,  inspiring;  and  we 
should,  with  adoring  thankfulness,  recognize 


86  THE  OBJECT  LESSON 

His  wonderful  providence  ;  but  we  must  not 
shut  our  eyes  to  the  certain  fact  that  there  is 
no  evidence  whatever  that  God  chose  men 
so  set  apart  from  their  fellows  as  to  be  above 
all  human  weakness  and  imperfections,  and 
supernaturally  endowed  with  a  power  to 
write  books  as  absolutely  free  from  imper- 
fection and  error  as  if  God  had  written  them 
with  His  own  finger. 

There  may  be  those  who  think  it  would 
have  been  a  great  deal  better  if  men  had 
been  specially  called  and  commissioned  to 
write  the  books  of  sacred  Scripture,  and  if 
each  of  them  had  been  given  a  distinct 
promise  that  they  would  be  kept  absolutely 
free  from  error ;  but  would  it  not  be  more 
reverent  and  humble  for  those  who  cannot 
help  thinking  such  thoughts  if,  instead  of 
criticising  what  God  has  done,  they  would 
rather  magnify  and  bless  His  holy  Name 
that  in  His  marvellous  providence  He  has 
not  allowed  His  revelation  to  Israel  to 
remain  unrecorded,  but  has  given  this  great 
Object  Lesson  to  us  and  all  the  nations  of 
mankind  in  a  manner  which,  though  we  may 
not  exactly  see  it  as  the  best,  is  yet  adequate 
to  teach  us  the  great  lessons  which  were 
taught    to    Israel    of    the   divine    holiness, 


THE  OBJECT  LESSON  87 

justice,    tenderness,    patience,    forgiveness, 
and  loving-kindness  ? 

Before  we  leave  the  subject  of  this  chapter 
it  may  be  well  to  interpose  a  caution  against 
two  extremes  in  estimating  the  value  of  the 
Hebrew  history  as  given  us  in  the  Bible. 
There  are  those  who  think  we  ought  to  be 
done  with  the  Old  Testament,  now  that  we 
have  the  complete  and  perfect  revelation  in 
the  New.  The  ancient  Hebrews  may  have 
needed  all  that  discipline  and  those  slow 
revealings  of  truth,  but  surely  we  are  far 
beyond  that  now  !  Is  it  not  enough  to  keep 
to  the  New  Testament  with  its  full,  clear 
light  ?  If  we  have  the  result,  why  trouble 
any  more  with  the  process  ?  The  answer 
is,  not  only  that  there  is  immense  interest 
and  valuable  instruction  to  be  had  from 
following  the  successive  stages  of  revelation, 
but  also  that  God  deals  with  us  as  individuals 
on  the  same  principles  as  He  dealt  with  the 
chosen  nation.  There  is  not  a  stage  in  the 
education  of  the  Children  of  Israel  which 
has  not  its  parallel  in  the  education  of  the 
children  of  God;  hence  it  is  that,  though 
in  Christ  we  have  all  we  need,  we  have 
most  valuable  illustrations  of  "the  truth  in 


88  THE   OBJECT   LESSON 

Jesus  "  In  these  Old  Testament  records,  and 
we  have  therefore  reason  to  be  devoutly 
thankful  that,  these  things  having  happened 
to  them  as  ensamples,  we  "upon  whom  the 
ends  of  the  world  have  come  " — i.e.  who  live 
in  the  age  of  the  completed  revelation — may 
learn  our  much-needed  lessons  of  faith,  hope, 
love,  obedience,  courage,  and  constancy. 

On  the  other  hand  we  ought  to  be  on  our 
guard  against  the  opposite  error  of  putting 
all  the  Scriptures  on  the  same  level.  While 
we  ought  diligently  to  search  and  study  the 
Old  Testament  Scriptures,  we  should  always 
do  so  in  the  light  of  the  full  and  perfect 
revelation  in  Christ  our  Lord,  on  the  prin- 
ciple which  He  Himself  distinctly  taught 
us  when  He  said,  "  Ye  have  heard  that  it 
hath  been  said  .  .  .  but  I  say  unto  you." 
Let  us  read  always  in  the  light  of  the  Spirit 
of  Christ,  who,  happily,  is  with  us  all  the 
days  even  to  the  end  of  the  world.  So  shall 
we  have  our  Object  Lesson  in  all  its  variety 
and  value  lying  full  and  clear  in  the  light  of 
the  Sun  of  Righteousness  risen  on  us  with 
healing  in  His  wings. 


CHAPTER  VII 
The  Substance  of  Revelation 

THE  fact  that  there  is  a  distinction 
between  revelation  and  the  record  of 
it  leads  to  the  inquiry,  What  is  the  substance 
of  revelation  ?  Revelation  is  enshrined,  as 
we  have  said,  in  the  sacred  Scriptures.  We 
have  discovered  (Chapter  H.)  with  a  certain 
degree  of  accuracy  what  is  the  field  to  be 
explored.  We  have  now  to  inquire  what 
is  the  treasure  in  the  field,  to  use  our  Lord's 
own  illustration.  Can  we  discover,  from 
looking  at  the  way  in  which  God  guided 
Israel,  the  messages  He  sent  her,  and  the 
completed  revelation  in  the  Holy  One  of 
Israel,  what  it  is  God's  desire  and  purpose 
to  make  known,  first  to  His  chosen  people 
and  then  to  the  world  through  them  ? 

Much  of  the  reasoning  in  past  times  on 
the  subject  of  insptration  has  proceeded 
on  the  supposition  that  the  revelation  God 

89 


90      THE  SUBSTANCE  OF  REVELATION 

intended  to  give  thereby  was  quite  enc5'clo- 
psedic,  covering  all  things  in  heaven  and  on 
earth,  and  settling  for  ever  all  doubtful 
disputations.  This  idea  was  due  to  that 
preconceived  theory  of  inspiration  already 
referred  to  (Chapter  III.),  according  to  which 
it  was  supposed  that  men  inspired  of  God 
must  be  so  completely  unmanned,  as  it  were, 
so  thoroughly  deified,  that  they  could  speak, 
like  supermen,  with  absolute  scientific  pre- 
cision on  every  subject  they  touched.  It 
was  pure  theory,  without  a  shred  of  evidence 
for  it.  There  is  no  claim  made  on  behalf 
of  the  greatest  of  the  prophets  or  the  chief 
of  the  apostles  that  he  was  called  to  set  the 
world  right  on  all  matters  within  the  range  of 
man's  investigation,  physical  or  metaphysical. 
The  emphasis  is  laid  throughout  on  the 
things  of  the  spirit,  on  the  things  of  God. 
And  while  the  subject  is  spiritual,  the  object 
is  practical.  "  Every  scripture  inspired  of 
God  is  also  profitable  for  teaching,  for 
reproof,  for  correction,  for  instruction  which 
is  in  righteousness,  that  the  man  of  God 
may  be  complete,  furnished  completely  unto 
every  good  work."  That  is  perhaps  the 
locus  classicus  on  the  subject  of  inspiration  ; 
yet  how  completely  it  has  been  discarded  by 


THE  SUBSTANCE  OF  REVELATION       91 

many  good  people  in  favour  of  the  theory 
that  Scripture  was  given  to  acquaint  people 
with  astronomy,  geology,  history,  and  every- 
thing else  under  the  sun,  and  above  it  too. 
This  view,  however,  is  now  practically  given 
up.  Almost  every  one  in  our  day  is  willing 
to  have  the  scope  of  Scripture  teaching 
limited  to  the  spiritual  and  the  practical. 

Even  within  this  still  wide  range,  however, 
there  are  certain  great  things  standing  out 
in  such  prominence  as  to  make  it  quite  clear 
that  the  Inspirer  of  the  sacred  Scriptures 
intended  us  to  give  special  attention  to  them. 
We  are  warned  again  and  again  against 
making  too  much  of  the  letter  and  too  little 
of  the  spirit.  The  Apostle  Paul  says  :  "  The 
letter  killeth,  the  spirit  giveth  life " ;  and 
our  Lord,  in  reproof  of  the  narrow-minded 
Jews  who  insisted  on  taking  literally  what 
He  had  said  about  eating  His  flesh  and 
drinking  His  blood,  made  this  important 
declaration  :  "  It  is  the  spirit  that  quickeneth ; 
the  flesh  profiteth  nothing  :  the  words  that 
I  speak  unto  you,  they  are  spirit  and  they 
are  life."  And  in  this  connection  it  is  not 
only  instructive,  but  most  pathetic,  to  refer 
to  the  chief  thing  He  has  to  say  about  search- 
ing the  Scriptures,  which  is  this :  "  In  them 


92      THE  SUBSTANCE  OF  REVELATION 

ye  think  ye  have  eternal  life,  and  they  are 
they  which  testify  of  Me,  but  ye  will  not 
come  unto  Me  that  ye  might  have  life." 
Consider  the  position  of  the  Saviour  of  the 
world,  for  whose  coming  the  long  discipline 
of  the  prophet  nation  had  been  a  continual 
preparation,  face  to  face  with  men  in  whose 
hands  was  the  record  of  it,  and  whose 
function  it  was  to  explain  it  to  the  people, 
but  whose  minds  were  so  occupied  with 
petty  details  that  they  missed  the  substance 
and  spirit  of  it  all.  They  paid  tithes  of 
mint  and  anise  and  cummin,  but  neglected 
the  weighty  matters  of  the  law.  They  read 
their  Bibles  diligently,  but  had  no  vision 
of  the  truth  therein  enshrined.  It  was  not 
merely  that  they  did  not  see  the  wood  for 
the  trees,  for  they  did  not  even  see  the  trees. 
The  outside  bark  they  did  cherish,  but  the 
inner  life  was  missed  entirely.  Hence  it 
came  to  pass  that,  for  all  their  searching  of 
the  Scriptures,  they  rejected  Him  to  whom 
all  the  Scriptures  bore  witness,  and  in  whom 
alone  they  could  find  the  life  they  sought. 

Let  us  beware  of  making  the  same  mis- 
take. The  revelation  God  has  given  us 
is  very  wide  and  very  varied.  But  clearly 
there  are   in   it  greater   things   and   lesser 


THE  SUBSTANCE   OF   REVELATION       93 

things.  The  Bible  is  not  a  level  plain;  it 
is  like  the  land  from  which  it  came — full 
of  great  mountain  masses.  It  will  help  us 
to  right  ideas  of  God's  purpose,  if  we  try  first 
to  single  out  those  great  masses,  the  lessons 
which  are  written  large  throughout  the  in- 
spired history  of  Israel,  and  find  their  centre 
in  Christ,  to  whom  they  all  bear  witness. 

First  of  all,  there  is  the  Name  of  God. 
The  great  object  of  the  divine  discipline 
of  Israel  was  to  enable  them  to  spell  out 
that  Name.  To  tell  the  Name  of  God  was 
not  the  easy  thing  unthinking  people  are 
apt  to  suppose.  When  Jacob,  brought  face 
to  face  with  God  at  Peniel,  made  the  re- 
quest, "  Tell  me  Thy  Name,"  he  no  doubt 
expected  a  simple  answer,  perhaps  in  a 
single  word.  But  no  such  answer  came. 
What  came  was  an  answer  in  deed,  not  in 
word :  "  He  blessed  him  there."  Is  not 
this  an  indication  of  the  only  way  in  which 
God  could  reveal  His  Name  effectually  ? 

Accordingly,  it  was  not  in  word,  but  in 
deed,  in  the  long  course  of  gracious  but 
faithful  dealing  with  Israel,  that  God  re- 
vealed His  Name.  The  revelation  was  not 
complete   till    He   came   in  flesh   who   was 


94      THE  SUBSTANCE  OF  REVELATION 

the  brightness  of  the  Father's  glory  and 
the  express  image  of  His  person — not  quite 
complete,  indeed,  until  the  crowning  revela- 
tion of  the  Cross  and  the  Resurrection,  for 
at  the  very  close  of  His  earthly  life  we 
hear  Him  saying  to  His  Father  :  "  I  have 
declared  unto  them  Thy  Name,  and  will 
declare  it:  that  the  love  wherewith  Thou 
hast  loved  Me  may  be  in  them,  and  I  in 
them."  This,  then,  is  the  main  substance  of 
revelation :  the  unveiling  of  God,  gradually 
through  the  sacred  history,  and  finally  in 
the  life  and  death  and  resurrection  of  Christ 
our  Lord.  It  is  in  this  above  all  that  we 
see  clearly  the  Bible  to  be  the  Word  of 
God.  In  the  highest  sense,  indeed,  Christ 
Himself  is  the  Word  of  God;  but  in  a 
subordinate  sense,  as  testifying  to  God  and 
His  Christ,  these  Scriptures  are  entitled  to 
this  unique  designation. 

But  there  needed  not  only  a  revelation 
of  God  to  man,  but  of  man  to  himself. 
That,  too,  we  have  throughout.  We  have 
not  only  a  line  of  light  revealing  the  Name 
of  God,  but  a  line  of  darkness  marking 
the  sin  of  man.  Side  by  side  with  the 
wonderful  story  of  the  creation  of  man  in 
the  image  of  God,  we  have  the  fact  of  sin 


THE  SUBSTANCE  OF  REVELATION      95 

set  forth,  not  in  philosophic  phrase,  but  in 
a  living  picture,  which  in  its  simple  way 
conveys  the  deepest  truths  as  to  sin's  in- 
sidious approaches,  its  virulence,  and  its 
fatal  issues — most  marvellous  combination 
of  the  simplicity  of  form  which  was  abso- 
lutely necessary  for  the  world's  childhood, 
and  the  profound  suggestiveness  which  is 
the  mark  of  its  high  inspiration.  And,  as 
the  revelation  begins,  so  it  proceeds,  unveil- 
ing the  Name  of  God  on  the  one  hand,  and 
the  shame  of  man  on  the  other — the  black 
lines  of  human  sin  set  in  the  revealing  light 
of  the  Sun  of  Righteousness.  There  is  no 
respect  of  persons  in  the  sacred  records. 
The  sins  of  Abraham  and  of  David  are 
painted  in  all  their  native  hideousness ;  the 
sins  of  the  holy  nation  are  as  unsparingly 
exposed  as  those  of  the  nations  who  knew 
not  God ;  and  in  the  New  Testament,  the 
sins  of  erring  apostles  and  disciples  are  as 
faithfully  recorded  as  those  of  the  chief 
priests  and  scribes.  But  ever  over  against 
the  sin  of  man  there  is  set  the  righteous- 
ness of  God,  reflected  in  His  law,  marked  in 
His  judgments,  and  finally  radiant  in  His  Son. 
This  makes  a  terrible  antithesis,  discloses 
a  mighty  gulf  between  God  and  man,  and 


96      THE  SUBSTANCE   OF  REVELATION 

raises  the  great  question :  How  shall  man 
be  just  with  God  ?  The  answer  to  this  ques- 
tion is  the  very  core  of  revelation,  namely, 
The  Salvation  of  God,  foreshadowed  in 
the  earlier  history,  pictured  in  the  great 
deliverance  from  Egypt,  and  signalized  in 
the  Song  of  Moses,  which  is  echoed  and 
re-echoed  by  prophet,  psalmist,  and  saint 
till  it  becomes  in  the  Apocalypse  the  Song 
of  Moses  and  the  Lamb  :  "  Behold,  God  is 
my  salvation ;  I  will  trust,  and  not  be 
afraid ;  for  the  Lord  Jehovah  is  my  strength 
and  my  song;  He  also  is  become  my  sal- 
vation "  (see  especially  Exodus  xv.  2,  Isaiah 
xii.  2,  and  Revelation  xv.  3).  We  see,  more- 
over, as  we  follow  the  course  of  revelation, 
that  the  salvation  must  be  by  Sacrifice. 
This  is  foreshadowed  in  the  Paschal  lamb 
and  throughout  the  Jewish  ritual,  set  forth 
in  the  suffering  Christ  of  Psalm  xxii.,  Isaiah 
liii.,  and  other  kindred  passages,  and  finds  its 
culmination  in  the  story  of  the  Cross  :  a  line 
of  thought  which  justifies  the  great  Apostle 
in  giving  as  the  sum  and  substance  of  his 
message,  "Jesus  Christ,  and  Him  crucified." 
We  get  thus  a  very  definite  subject  for 
the  Bible  as  a  whole.  The  man  in  the 
street  would  say  it  was  a  book  on  religion. 


THE  SUBSTANCE   OF   REVELATION      97 

Yet,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  religion  is  not  once 
mentioned  in  the  Old  Testament  and  scarcely 
ever  in  the  New.  We  might  indeed  say 
not  at  all,  for  while  the  word  occurs  in  two 
places  (Acts  xxvi.  5  and  James  i.  26,  27), 
it  is  not  in  the  wide  sense  in  which  we  use 
it,  but  corresponds  rather  to  our  idea  of 
worship  or  "divine  service,"  while  the  ex- 
pression "the  Jews'  religion"  in  Galatians 
i.  13,  14  is  in  the  original  simply  "  Judaism." 
If  then,  as  so  many  suppose,  the  Bible  is 
a  book  of  religion,  how  comes  it  to  pass 
that  practically  the  word  is  never  used  ? 
What  takes  its  place  ?  The  great  word 
"Salvation,"  which  rings  through  the  Bible 
like  a  joy-bell  from  the  beginning  to  the  end. 
As  the  result  of  our  inquiry,  then,  we 
find  that  the  great  themes  of  the  Bible  are 
God,  Man,  Sin,  Righteousness,  Salvation, 
and  Sacrifice,  and  accordingly  the  main 
substance  of  the  Bible  may  be  helpfully 
suggested  by  the  following  device  which 
the  author  of  this  little  book  has  frequently 
used  in  Bible-class  work  : — 

GOD 
SIN  —^  sp«  RIGHTEOUSNESS 


MAN  ._ 


98      THE   SUBSTANCE  OF  REVELATION 

which,  being  interpreted,  means  the  Salva- 
tion of  God,  for  Man,  from  Sin,  to  Righteous- ~ 
ness,  through  Christ  and  Him  crucified.  All 
this  is  summarized  in  the  word  **  Gospel," 
which  may  therefore  be  given  as  the  great 
outstanding  subject  of  revelation.  For,  be 
it  remembered,  though  the  great  subjects 
of  God  and  Man  and  Sin  and  Righteous- 
ness are  all  included,  these  are  all  dealt  with 
only  in  relation  to  the  central  theme  of 
Salvation.  There  is  no  attempt,  for  example, 
to  give  a  philosophy  of  sin  or  an  explanation 
of  its  mystery,  but  only  such  an  exhibition 
of  its  hatefulness  and  horror  and  ruinous 
results  as  to  prompt  the  question.  What 
shall  we  do  to  be  saved  ?  Nor  can  we 
find  in  Scripture  a  complete  anthropology. 
There  is  much  indeed  to  be  learned  from 
it  on  what  the  Greek  philosopher  called 
"  The  proper  study  of  mankind,"  namely, 
Man ;  but  here  again  we  are  only  to  expect 
those  points  which  stand  related  to  the  great 
Salvation.  Even  on  the  doctrine  of  God, 
though,  as  we  have  seen,  the  unfolding  of 
the  Name  of  God  is  one  chief  object  of 
revelation,  yet  are  we  not  to  expect  a  com- 
plete theology.  Rather  are  we  discouraged 
from  the  attempt  by  a  question  like  this : 


THE  SUBSTANCE   OF  REVELATION      99 

"  Who  can  by  searching  find  out  God  ? " 
We  often  think  of  the  doctrine  of  the 
Trinity  as  among  the  essentials  of  the  faith  ; 
and  there  are  good  grounds  for  seeing  in 
it  the  only  thoroughly  rational  basis  for  an 
intelligent  Theism.  But  even  the  doctrine 
of  the  Trinity  is  nowhere  dogmatically 
taught  in  Scripture.  It  comes  in  exclu- 
sively in  its  practical  bearing,  as  connected 
with  the  great  Salvation  which  is  summed 
up  in  the  benediction  :  "  The  grace  of  our 
Lord  Jesus  Christ,  and  the  love  of  God,  and 
the  fellowship  of  the  Holy  Ghost " ;  so  it 
is  only  in  relation  to  the  Gospel  that  even 
the  doctrine  of  the  Trinity  is  unfolded  in 
Scripture.  Thus,  from  every  point  of  view, 
the  Gospel  of  Salvation  is  the  central  theme. 
No  candid  reader  can  fail  to  recognize 
the  palmary  position  given  to  the  Gospel  of 
Salvation  throughout  the  New  Testament. 
For  once  that  you  hear  of  the  Bible  or  the 
Scriptures,  you  hear  of  Salvation  and  the 
Gospel  a  hundred  times.  So,  too,  it  is  not 
Preach  the  Bible,  but  Preach  the  Gospel, 
or  Preach  the  Word,  which  evidently  means 
the  same  thing,  as  in  the  passage,  "  To  you 
is  the  Word  of  this  Salvation  sent."  Nor 
is   it   Believe    the    Bible,    but   Believe   the 


loo    THE  SUBSTANCE   OF  REVELATION 

Gospel.  It  follows  that  those  who  lay  all 
the  stress  on  what  are  really  side-issues, 
however  interesting  they  may  be,  are  not 
treating  God's  revelation  according  to  the 
purpose  for  which  He  gave  it.  The  range 
is  very  wide,  but  the  centre  should  always 
be,  "  God  in  Christ  reconciling  the  world 
to  Himself." 

This  central  theme  of  revelation  cannot  be 
missed  with  any  honest  dealing  with  the 
Scripture.  There  are  those  who  make  an 
extended  use  of  the  Bible  and  yet  fail  to 
apprehend  the  Gospel ;  but  it  is  by  wilfully 
neglecting  that  which  stands  out  clear  and 
prominent.  Let  a  man  survey  the  Bible 
as  a  whole  with  any  sense  of  perspective, 
and  the  central  theme  will  appear  full  and 
clear  and  unmistakable.  The  wayfaring 
man,  though  a  fool,  will  not  err  therein. 
We  do  not  guarantee,  however,  that  the 
**  wise  "  man  will  not  err,  the  man  we  mean 
who  makes  up  his  mind  beforehand  what 
there  ought  to  be  in  the  Bible  and  what 
there  ought  not  to  be,  who  therefore  will 
take  liberties  with  it,  rule  out  all  that  is 
not  easily  reconciled  with  his  preconceived 
ideas,  and  instead  of  the  Gospel  submit 
some    scheme    of   his    own    philosophy   or 


THE  SUBSTANCE  OF   REVELATION     loi 

ethics  or  "  religion."  One  often  wonders 
why  our  friends  who  insist  on  every  part 
of  the  Bible  being  equally  inspired  do  not 
see  how  they  undermine  their  own  position 
in  regard  to  a  matter  on  which  happily  they 
are  as  a  rule  equally  insistent,  namely,  the 
duty  of  giving  the  Gospel  its  due  place  of 
prominence.  On  the  principle  of  all  parts 
of  Scripture  being  equally  inspired,  one 
might  preach  on  the  Bible  for  fifty  years 
and  never  once  bring  the  Gospel  in.  One 
sees  no  logical  way  of  countering  this  un- 
faithfulness to  the  sacred  Scriptures  except 
by  acknowledging  in  theory  as  well  as  in 
practice  the  supreme  importance  of  the 
central  theme  of  the  Bible. 

It  ought  surely  to  be  a  subject  of  devout 
thankfulness  that,  whatever  difficulties  may 
attend  outlying  and  comparatively  unim- 
portant subjects,  the  main  substance  of 
revelation  stands  out  so  full  and  clear, 
quite  untouched  by  the  many  difficulties 
raised  by  modern  criticism.  One  can  be 
quite  indifferent  as  to  the  question  of  the 
canon,  or  as  to  the  vowel  points,  or  the 
hundred  and  fifty  thousand  errors  in  tran- 
scription which  some  have  reckoned  up,  or 


102    THE  SUBSTANCE  OF   REVELATION 

any  number  of  blunders  in  translation,  or 
uncertainties  of  any  kind.  You  might  take 
away  book  after  book,  every  book  concern- 
ing which  there  ha^  ever  been  suggested 
a  reasonable  doubt ;  and  enough  would 
remain.  Think  what  a  revelation  there 
often  is  in  a  single  verse,  such  as  John  iii. 
1 6.  A  single  Gospel  would  be  a  great 
abundance.  How,  then,  should  our  hearts 
swell  with  gratitude  to  Him  who  has 
given  such  a  large  and  abundant  and  satis- 
fying revelation  of  the  Gospel  of  His  grace, 
dimly  foreshadowed,  perhaps,  in  the  story 
of  the  Fall,  but  getting  clearer  and  clearer 
as  we  come  down  the  ages  till  it  blazes 
out  in  Christ,  especially  in  the  Cross,  as 
interpreted  by  the  Incarnation  on  the  one 
side  and  the  Resurrection  on  the  other. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

Verification :  Authority  and  Vision 

SOME  one  may  interpose  here  and  say, 
it  may  be  a  fine  thing  to  have  a 
Gospel,  or  the  Gospel  if  you  choose,  written 
large  in  the  Scriptures,  and  made  so  plain 
that  none  can  miss  it,  but  how  can  I  be 
sure  of  it  ?  Where  is  my  authority  ?  If 
I  have  not  an  assurance  that  all  these 
Scriptures  are  so  inspired  that  I  can  trust 
every  word  of  them,  how  can  I  be  sure  of 
the  Gospel  that  is  in  them  ? 

Here  again  let  us  proceed  according  to 
our  method,  which  is  not  to  settle  in  our 
minds  beforehand  how  the  Gospel  ought 
to  be  verified,  but  what  God  has  actually 
done  in  the  way  of  verification.  Now  we 
find  when  we  follow  the  course  of  God's 
dealings  with  His  people  that  it  is  not 
His    usual    plan    to    appeal    to    a  written 

103 


I04  VERIFICATION 

document  for  verification  of  His  Gospel. 
As  a  rule  it  is  a  much  more  direct  appeal 
to  the  conscience  and  heart  of  man.  So 
was  the  Gospel  preached  to  Abraham,  so 
was  the  law  given  to  Moses,  and  through 
him  to  the  people.  When  the  prophets 
were  charged  with  messages  from  God, 
there  was  the  same  direct  appeal  to  the 
heart  and  conscience  of  the  people.  So 
with  the  preaching  of  the  Gospel  in  the  New 
Testament.  Christ  spoke  with  authority, 
not  as  the  Scribes,  the  difference  being 
that  He  appealed  directly  to  heart  and 
conscience,  while  their  appeal  was  to  the 
letter  of  the  law.  When  Pilate  asks  Him, 
*'  What  is  truth  ?  "  He  does  not  refer  him 
to  the  Old  Testament  Scriptures,  but  says, 
"  Every  one  that  is  of  the  truth  heareth  My 
voice."  He  recognized  indeed  that  though 
the  truth  shone  by  its  own  light,  the  hearts 
of  men  were  dark,  often  so  very  dark  that 
they  could  not  see  it.  In  such  cases  even 
He  could  do  nothing.  His  only  recourse 
was  to  speak  in  parables,  which  He  knew 
could  not  possibly  be  understood  by  the 
people  in  their  present  state  of  mind,  but 
being  easily  remembered,  might  recur  in  a 
more  favoirable  time  and  shine  with  their 


AUTHORITY  AND  VISION  105 

own  light.  See  also  His  answer  to  the 
question  "  Who  is  this  Son  of  Man "  in 
John  xii.  35,  36;  His  going  abruptly  away 
to  hide  Himself  from  them  ;  and  the  remarks 
made  upon  it  in  the  passage  immediately 
following.  When  people  were  not  ready 
to  receive  the  truth  He  made  no  attempt  to 
coerce  by  external  authority.  He  recog- 
nized that  the  Gospel,  even  when  presented 
with  the  greatest  clearness  and  on  the 
highest  authority,  is  of  no  use  without  the 
inward  witness  :  "  No  man  can  come  to 
Me,  except  the  Father  which  hath  sent  Me 
draw  him."  When  the  inward  witness  is 
there,  it  is  enough,  no  other  authority  is 
needed :  "  Every  man  that  hath  heard,  and 
hath  learned  of  the  Father,  cometh  unto  Me  " 
(John  vi.  45).  This  does  not  mean  that  He 
made  nothing  of  external  authority,  but  that 
its  place  was  quite  subordinate,  as  shown  for 
example  in  such  an  appeal  as  this  :  "  Believe 
Me  that  I  am  in  the  Father,  and  the  Father 
in  Me;  or  else  believe  Me  for  the  very 
works'  sake."  There  was  verification  in 
the  works,  a  verification  not  at  all  to  be 
despised ;  but  the  other  was  far  better,  the 
verification  from  inner  vision  rather  than 
from  authority. 


io6  VERIFICATION 

The  Apostles  proceeded  on  the  same  prin- 
ciple. As  St.  Paul  put  it :  "  We  preach  not 
ourselves,  but  Christ  Jesus  the  Lord,  ...  by- 
manifestation  of  the  truth  commending  our- 
selves to  every  man's  conscience  in  the  sight 
of  God."  He  appeals,  indeed,  to  the  Scrip- 
tures in  dealing  with  the  Jews,  who  denied 
that  Jesus  was  the  Christ,  and  in  controversy 
with  Judaizing  Christians  he  appealed  to  his 
calling,  and  apostleship,  and  inspiration ;  but 
in  the  preaching  of  the  Gospel  to  the  heathen 
he  evidently  expected  the  truth  to  come  with 
its  own  authority. 

Authority — External  and  Internal. 

We  find,  then,  that  there  are  two  kinds  of 
authority,  external  and  internal;  that,  while 
both  are  useful,  the  latter  is  much  the  more 
important,  and  is  the  only  one  which  is 
absolutely  essential  for  verification.  The 
former  helps  towards  the  truth,  but  veri- 
fication is  not  complete  till  the  truth  shines 
by  its  own  light.  Many  a  one  is  convinced 
and  saved  by  the  simple  appeal  of  the  truth 
itself.  The  outward  authority  may  bring 
within  sight  of  the  truth,  but  it  is  the  inner 
vision  which  sees  it.  That  inner  vision  is 
faith.     And   the   essence  of  faith   is  not  a 


AUTHORITY  EXTERNAL  AND  INTERNAL  107 

blind,  easy-going  assent  to  the  statement  of 
some  person  or  persons  regarded  as  an  autho- 
rity external  to  our  own  minds  and  hearts ; 
it  is  an  energy  of  mind,  and  heart,  and  soul 
going  out  to  the  truth,  especially  to  Him 
who  is  the  Truth,  and  accepting  it  as 
bringing  its  own  credentials  direct  from  the 
Father  of  Lights. 

It  is  of  the  greatest  importance  in  dealing 
with  this  whole  subject  to  remember  that 
God  never  interferes  with  human  freedom. 
He  never  overbears  a  man's  personality. 
This  applies,  not  only  to  the  subjects  of 
divine  inspiration,  but  to  those  to  whom 
their  message  comes.  People  are  never 
coerced  into  faith ;  they  must  be  won  to  it, 
by  something  which  appeals  to  that  which  is 
within  them.  There  is  never  the  least  sug- 
gestion of  an  infallible  authority  standing  in 
front  of  a  human  soul,  and  saying,  "There 
are  certain  things  you  must  believe,  whether 
they  appeal  to  you  or  not,  whether  you  wel- 
come them  or  not,  whether  they  awaken  any 
response  of  conviction  or  not."  There  is  no 
such  thing  as  the  demand  of  blind  submis- 
sion ;  the  faith  must  not  be  of  the  nature  of 
soul  slumber  or  enforced  mental  inactivity; 
it  is  not  faith  at  all  if  it  be  not  free.     As 


io8  VERIFICATION 

Schopenhauer  said  :  "  Faith  is  like  love  ;  it 
cannot  be  forced." 

Our  Lord  Himself  insisted  very  much  on 
the  necessary  connection  of  faith  and  free- 
dom :  *'  Ye  shall  know  the  truth,"  He  says, 
"and  the  truth  shall  make  you  free."  And, 
again,  "Ye  seek  to  kill  Me,  because  My 
word  hath  not  free  course  in  you."  *'  Free 
course "  observe,  and  that  was  said  to  those 
who  believed  in  the  most  thorough  way  in 
the  verbal  and  literal  inspiration  of  the 
Scriptures.  Their  belief  was  not  genuine 
faith.  They  were  slaves  of  the  letter,  and 
knew  nothing  of  the  freedom  of  the  spirit. 
And  so  it  often  is  in  our  own  times.  If  a 
person  is  not  in  sympathy  with  the  truth,  he 
will  not  find  the  Gospel  in  the  Scriptures, 
though  he  be  a  believer  in  the  literal  inspira- 
tion of  every  word  of  the  Bible.  On  the 
other  hand,  a  person  who  is  in  sympathy 
with  the  truth  will  surely  find  it,  even  though 
he  may  have  no  theory  of  inspiration,  and 
not  even  a  thought  of  it.  Because  he  is  of 
the  truth,  he  will  hear  the  Voice  Divine, 
which  is  the  true  authority.  He  will  be 
like  the  Samaritans,  who,  encouraged  by 
the  testimony  of  the  woman  (the  external 
authority),  came  and  saw  for  themselves  (the 


AUTHORITY  EXTERNAL  AND  INTERNAL  109 

inner  vision),  and  said,  "  Now  we  believe, 
not  because  of  thy  saying :  for  we  have 
heard  for  ourselves,  and  know  that  this  is 
indeed  the  Saviour  of  the  world."  In  this 
instance  we  see  the  true  relation  between  the 
external  and  the  internal  authority.  The 
one,  the  external  authority,  awakens  interest 
and  leads  to  inquiry ;  but  it  is  the  latter  (the 
inner  vision)  which  is  the  final  verification, 
the  true  ground  of  certainty. 

It  may  be  well,  before  proceeding  further, 
to  notice  a  very  common  error  in  regard  to 
the  relation  of  the  Protestant  Reformation 
to  the  question  of  authority  in  matters 
of  religion.  The  supposition  is  that  the 
reformers  simply  exchanged  one  external 
authority  for  another,  turning  from  an  in- 
fallible Church  to  an  infallible  Bible  as  the 
supreme  arbiter.  It  is  an  entire  mistake. 
The  early  reformers  certainly  gave  up  the 
idea  of  an  infallible  Church,  but  what  they 
put  in  its  place  was  the  perpetual  presence 
of  Christ  Himself  with  His  people,  the 
witness  of  the  Spirit  with  the  word  responded 
to  by  the  Spirit-guided  soul.  There  are 
those  who  think  that  Luther  was  quite 
peculiar  in  the  freedom  with  which  he  dealt 
with  sacred   Scripture.     Every   one   knows 


no  VERIFICATION 

that  he  condemned  the  Epistle  of  James  as 
"  an  epistle  of  straw."  But  every  one  does 
not  know  that  Calvin,  who  may  be  supposed 
to  represent  the  more  rigid  school  of  the 
reformers,  though  less  rash  in  his  language, 
was  as  far  as  Luther  himself  from  accepting 
the  rigid  theory  of  inspiration  afterwards 
introduced.  He  deals  with  the  whole  subject 
in  his  "  Institutes,"  where  he  makes  it  clear 
that  what  he  sets  over  against  the  idea  of 
an  infallible  Church  is  the  reality  of  an  ever- 
present  Spirit  in  contact  with  the  minds  of 
the  truly  devout.  "  Profane  men,"  he  says, 
"  desire  and  insist  to  have  it  proved  by 
reason  that  Moses  and  the  prophets  were 
divinely  inspired.  But  I  answer  that  the 
testimony  of  the  Spirit  is  superior  to  reason. 
For  as  God  alone  can  properly  bear  witness 
to  His  own  words,  so  these  words  will  not 
obtain  full  credit  in  the  hearts  of  men  until 
they  are  sealed  by  the  inward  testimony  of 
the  Spirit.  The  same  Spirit,  therefore,  who 
spoke  by  the  mouth  of  the  prophets,  must 
penetrate  our  hearts,  in  order  to  convince 
us  that  they  faithfully  delivered  the  message 
with  which  they  were  divinely  entrusted. 
This  connection  is  most  aptly  expressed  by 
Isaiah   in   these  words,   *  My  spirit  that    is 


AUTHORITY  EXTERNAL  AND  INTERNAL   iii 

Upon  thee,  and  My  words  which  I  have  put 
in  thy  mouth,  shall  not  depart  out  of  thy 
mouth,  nor  out  of  the  mouth  of  thy  seed,  nor 
out  of  the  mouth  of  thy  seed's  seed,  saith  the 
Lord,  from  henceforth  and  for  ever.' "  And 
again  (Calvin  says),  "  Scripture,  carrying  its 
own  evidence  along  with  it,  deigns  not  to 
submit  to  proofs  and  arguments,  but  owes 
the  full  conviction  with  which  we  ought  to 
receive  it  to  the  testimony  of  the  Spirit." 

In  the  Thirty-Nine  Articles  of  the  Church 
of  England  there  is  no  theory  of  inspiration. 
What  is  specially  declared  there  is  "The 
sufficiency  of  the  Holy  Scriptures  for  salva- 
tion." So,  too,  the  fifth  article  of  the  West- 
minster Confession  of  Faith,  after  referring 
to  the  value  of  the  testimony  of  the  Church 
to  the  Scriptures,  and  to  the  evidence  of  their 
divine  authority  to  be  found  in  the  heaven- 
liness  of  the  matter,  the  efficacy  of  the 
doctrine,  the  majesty  of  the  style,  etc.  (all 
appealing  to  the  human  power  of  apprecia- 
tion), proceeds,  "  Notwithstanding,  our  full 
persuasion  and  assurance  of  the  infallible 
truth,  and  divine  authority  thereof,  is  from 
the  inward  work  of  the  Holy  Spirit,  bearing 
witness  by  and  with  the  word  in  our  hearts." 
Perhaps  most  distinct  of  all  is  the  answer 


112  VERIFICATION 

in  the  larger  Catechism  to  the  question, 
"  How  doth  it  appear  that  the  Scriptures 
are  the  word  of  God  ? "  which  is :  "  The 
Scriptures  manifest  themselves  to  be  the 
word  of  God  by  their  majesty  and  purity; 
by  the  consent  of  all  the  parts,  which  is  to 
give  all  glory  to  God ;  by  their  light  and 
power  to  convince  and  convert  sinners,  to 
comfort  and  build  up  believers  unto  salva- 
tion :  but  the  Spirit  of  God  bearing  witness 
by  and  with  the  Scriptures  in  the  heart  of 
man  is  alone  able  fully  to  persuade  it  that 
they  are  the  very  word  of  God."  It  is  also 
very  significant  that  the  Heidelberg  Cate- 
chism, extending  to  as  many  as  a  hundred 
and  twenty-nine  questions,  makes  no  refer- 
ence whatever  to  the  Scriptures. 

From  such  authoritative  documents  of  the 
Reformation  as  these  it  is  abundantly  evident 
that  there  was  no  shifting  from  the  external 
authority  of  an  infallible  Church  to  the 
equally  external  authority  of  an  infallible 
Book,  but  an  appeal  first  to  what  the 
Scriptures  manifest  themselves  to  be  to  the 
devout  soul,  and  next,  as  the  supreme  autho- 
rity, to  the  Spirit  of  God  bearing  witness 
by  and  with  the  Scriptures  in  the  heart  of 
man. 


AUTHORITY  IN   LIFE  113 

Authority  in  Life  and  in  Religion, 
The  subject  of  authority  in  religion  is  a 
very  large  one.  To  understand  it  thoroughly 
we  would  need  to  consider  what  a  large  place 
authority  has  in  our  whole  life.  We  come 
into  the  world  under  the  influence  of  heredity, 
an  influence  which  does  not  spring  from  our 
own  souls,  and  therefore  is  of  the  nature  of 
authority.  We  grow  up  under  the  influence 
of  our  environment,  which  again  has  potent 
effect  in  the  making  and  moulding  of  us. 
We  are  under  parental  authority  during  our 
childhood  and  early  youth,  and  our  whole 
education  is  conducted  under  the  authority 
of  our  teachers,  including  the  books  from 
which  we  study  as  well  as  the  persons  from 
whom  we  learn  our  lessons.  When  we  enter 
on  our  work  in  the  world,  we  have  a  heritage 
of  the  past  from  which  it  would  be  as  vain 
as  it  would  be  foolish  to  try  to  escape.  Not 
a  day  passes  in  which  we  do  not  take  action 
on  the  ground  of  convictions  which  are  not 
the  product  of  our  own  minds,  but  have  come 
to  us  out  of  the  experience  of  those  who 
have  gone  before  us.  But  while  we  are  thus 
beset  before  and  behind  with  authority  of 
various  kinds   and  degrees,  it   is   evidently 

I 


114  VERIFICATION 

God's  purpose  concerning  us  that  we  should 
maintain  our  freedom,  and  develop  an  indi- 
viduality not  crushed  by  authority  but  evolved 
out  of  it.  So  it  is  in  the  matter  of  our 
religious  development.  The  same  sets  of 
influences  affect  us  in  this  department  of  our 
life.  We  come  under  the  influence  of  external 
authority  of  parent,  teacher,  friend,  spiritual 
adviser ;  but  as  we  grow  up  we  are  more 
and  more  called  to  exercise  our  freedom. 

There  are  many  who  think  it  dangerous 
in  matters  of  religion  to  leave  anything  to 
the  freedom  of  the  individual  soul.  How 
can  we  trust  it?  they  say.  The  heart  is 
deceitful  above  all  things  ;  what  room  is 
there  for  the  assertion  of  its  freedom  ? 
What  we  want  is  an  authority  quite  in- 
dependent of  the  human  soul,  which  does 
not  ask  its  assent,  but  compels  it;  which 
settles  everything  for  it,  and  does  not  expose 
it  to  the  danger  of  settling  anything  for 
itself. 

But  a  very  little  consideration  will  show 
how  utterly  futile  is  this  position.  There  are 
always  competing  claims  for  our  allegiance, 
and  how  are  these  to  be  settled  ?  Take 
three  typical  cases  as  illustrations. 

(i)  The  Romanist  finds  rest  in  his  faith 


AUTHORITY   IN   RELIGION  115 

in  an  infallible  Church,  but  before  finding 
it  he  must  accept  his  Church  as  infallible. 
Surely  that  is  an  exercise  of  freedom,  if  it 
is  anything.  Is  there  not  some  danger 
of  his  being  wrong  in  that  acceptance  ?  Is 
not  the  ultimate  authority  in  his  case  the 
validity  of  the  act  of  his  soul  by  which  he 
accepts  the  Church  of  Rome  as  an  infallible 
guide  ? 

(2)  The  same  principle  is  applicable  to 
those  who  find  rest  in  the  conviction  that 
they  have  in  their  possession  a  book,  every 
line  and  word  of  which  is  beyond  the  reach 
of  error.  But  how  has  the  man  reached 
that  conviction  ?  Is  it  by  his  own  investiga- 
tion ?  Then  how  can  he  be  sure  that  he 
has  not  made  some  mistake  ?  Or  is  it 
because  he  has  been  so  taught  from  his 
youth  ?  Then  is  his  ultimate  authority  not 
a  whit  better  than  that  of  the  Romanist  who 
believes  in  the  infallibility  of  his  Church. 
And  it  is  evident  that  whatever  reason  he 
gives  for  accepting  the  infallibility  of  the 
Bible,  the  ultimate  appeal  is  to  his  own 
judgment  in  so  accepting  it,  which  is  surely 
anything  but  an  infallible  authority.  We 
cannot  by  any  jugglery  of  logic  get  away 
from  the  difficulty  of  personal  responsibility 


ii6  VERIFICATION 

in  accepting  or  rejecting  the  truth.  If  our 
acceptance  is  blind,  it  is  of  course  worth- 
less. If  it  is  founded  on  reason,  then  it 
shares  the  uncertainty  attaching  to  all  human 
reasoning.  Seeing  then  that  it  is  quite 
impossible  to  escape  the  exercise  of  personal 
judgment  in  the  acceptance  of  the  truth, 
why  should  it  be  thought  a  thing  incredible 
that  God  should  lay  upon  us  the  responsi- 
bility of  recognizing  His  Gospel  as  it  shines 
forth  in  the  pages  of  the  Bible  ? 

(3)  Take  the  case  of  a  person  who  has 
not  been  able  to  find  sufficient  evidence  that 
any  Church  is  infallible,  and  moreover  has 
not  been  able  to  find  sufficient  evidence  that 
every  line  of  the  Bible  is  inspired.  He 
finds,  however,  a  claim  of  inspiration  on  the 
part  of  certain  prophets  and  apostles,  and 
especially  on  the  part  of  Him  to  whom  all 
the  prophets  and  apostles  bear  witness.  He 
reads  their  utterances  humbly,  reverently, 
and  expectantly,  and  as  he  reads,  a  light 
above  the  brightness  of  the  sun  flashes  in 
upon  him,  a  voice  which  he  cannot  but 
recognize  as  truly  divine  speaks  to  his  soul, 
searches  his  heart,  elevates  his  affections, 
exercises  a  purifying  effect  on  his  life  ;  as 
he  continues  to  read  there  rises  before  the 


AUTHORITY  IN   RELIGION  T17 

faith  of  his  soul  a  living  Friend,  with  whom 
he  comes  into  conscious  touch,  with  whom 
he  grows  into  the  acquaintance  of  trust  and 
love,  until  he  can  say,  "  I  know  whom  I  have 
believed,  and  am  persuaded  that  He  is  able 
to  keep  that  which  I  have  committed  unto 
Him."  Is  that  man  leaning  more  on  his 
own  understanding,  and  trusting  less  to 
divine  guidance  than  if  he  had  previously 
reasoned  himself  into  the  belief  in  an  in- 
fallible Church  or  an  infallible  Bible  ?  If 
you  ask  him  what  is  his  ultimate  and 
supreme  authority,  he  will  point  you  not 
to  a  Church,  nor  to  a  Book,  but  to  the 
living  Christ  whose  Spirit  guides  him  into 
the  truth.  It  is  true  that  his  ultimate 
authority  does  not  reach  him  through  the 
eye  as  in  the  case  of  the  man  who  finds 
it  in  the  Book,  nor  through  the  ear  as  in 
the  case  of  the  man  who  finds  it  in  the 
priest  speaking  in  the  name  of  the  Church ; 
but  is  the  witness  of  the  invisible  Spirit 
of  God  in  direct  contact  with  his  spirit  to 
be  treated  as  a  thing  of  nought,  because 
there  is  in  his  case  no  external  authority 
on  which  to  lean  ? 

There    is   no   verification   possible,    apart 
from  the  acceptance  by  the  human  spirit  of 


ii8  VERIFICATION 

the  divine  message,  the  response  of  the  soul 
to  the  claim  made  on  its  allegiance.  And 
though  there  is,  from  the  nature  of  the  case, 
a  measure  of  uncertainty  in  the  conviction 
which  arises  out  of  the  response  of  the  spirit 
to  the  voice  of  God  in  the  utterances  of 
prophets,  apostles,  and  Christ  Himself,  it 
can  surely  be  no  greater  than  in  that  which 
arises  from  the  surrender  of  the  mind  to  the 
claim  made  upon  it  by  an  infallible  Church 
or  an  infallible  Book. 

Authority — Ultimate  and  Proximate. 

If  we  think  the  matter  out  with  any  care, 
we  shall  find  that  God's  method  is  the  only 
one  which  conserves  human  freedom.  The 
truth,  whatever  it  be,  whether  it  be  identified 
with  the  Church,  or  the  Bible,  or  the  Gospel 
of  Christ  Himself,  must  in  the  last  resort 
appeal  to  the  conscience  and  heart  of  man. 
External  authority — of  which  there  is  abun- 
dance, as  we  have  already  seen,  running 
alonof  the  whole  course  of  divine  revelation 
— may  bring  a  man  face  to  face  with  the 
truth,  but  only  the  vision  of  the  mind  and  the 
embrace  of  the  heart  can  make  it  his  own. 

This  may  seem  very  unsatisfactory  to 
those   who  have  been   accustomed   to   call 


AUTHORITY  ULTIMATE  AND  PROXIMATE  119 

for  some  outward  authority  as  the  last 
resort ;  but  surely  it  is  more  humble  and 
reverent  and  loyal  to  accept  the  fundamental 
position  of  our  Lord  Himself,  when  He 
said,  on  the  subject  of  verification,  "  Every 
one  that  is  of  the  truth  heareth  My  voice." 

It  is  only  fair  to  acknowledge  that  the 
great  majority  of  those  who  seem  to  found 
their  faith  on  the  theory  of  verbal  inspiration 
have  in  reality  a  far  better  and  stronger 
foundation  on  which  to  rest.  They,  too, 
have  an  experience  as  rich  and  satisfactory 
as  any.  Being  of  the  truth,  they  hear  the 
divine  voice  in  the  Scriptures ;  they  see 
visions  of  God,  and  have  the  happy  con- 
sciousness of  the  presence  with  them  of 
the  unseen  Friend,  and  the  witness  of  His 
Spirit  in  their  hearts.  It  is  this  unquestion- 
able experience  which  makes  their  faith  so 
clear  and  strong  and  constant;  and  it  is 
their  sense  of  the  preciousness  and  the 
certain  validity  of  this  experience  which 
makes  them  so  sensitive  to  any  suggestions 
of  doubt  as  to  what  they  suppose  to  be 
the  foundation  of  their  faith.  But  if  they 
would  only  consider  carefully  what  is  the 
real  ground  of  their  confidence,  they  would 
find  it  was  not   the  external  authority,  but 


I20  VERIFICATION 

the  appeal  of  the  voice  of  Christ  and  the 
truth  of  God  to  all  that  is  noblest  and  best 
in  their  renewed  natures.  If  they  realized 
this,  they  would  cease  to  be  troubled  with 
questions  v/hich  touch  only  the  external 
authority,  and  are  completely  irrelevant  to 
that  which  affects  the  living  issue. 

The  case  of  these  brethren,  among  whom 
are  found  many  of  earth's  noblest,  and  of  the 
devoutest  and  most  self-denying  of  Chris- 
tians, has  been  once  for  all  set  forth  in 
the  illustration  given  by  the  late  Dr.  Dale, 
where  he  tells  of  the  sore  troubles  in  Carr's 
Lane  Church  by  the  discovery  that  two 
large  pillars  had  to  be  removed  in  order 
to  afford  space  for  an  organ.  There  were 
elaborate  calculations  as  to  how  the  lost 
support  could  be  made  up  in  other  ways, 
and  at  last  a  way  was  found  by  which  it 
was  thought  they  could  be  safely  removed. 
And  when  the  work  began,  and  the  pillars 
were  dealt  with,  it  was  found  that  they  did 
not  go  to  the  bottom,  and  therefore  only 
seemed  to  be  pillars,  and  that  instead  of 
supporting  the  beam  they  were  hung  from 
it.  This  is  an  exact  parallel  to  the  case 
of  those  who  have  really  an  immovable 
foundation    for   their  faith,  while  they  trust 


AUTHORITY  ULTIMATE  AND  PROXIMATE  121 

to  the  seeming  pillars  of  a  human  theory 
of  inspiration  and  authority.  Their  theory 
of  inspiration,  instead  of  supporting  their 
faith  in  Christ,  as  they  suppose,  is  really 
supported  by  it.  There  is  one  difference, 
however,  that  in  Carr's  Lane  the  pillars  did 
not  weaken  the  structure.  In  this  case  they 
do,  for  there  are  tens  of  thousands  of  people 
who  have  been  so  brought  up  in  the  belief 
that  everything  turns  on  the  absolute  in- 
errancy of  every  word  of  Scripture,  that- 
when  any  question  arises,  not  in  regard  to 
the  substance  or  the  spirit,  the  object  or 
effect  of  the  whole,  but  as  to  some  matter 
of  small  detail,  they  at  once  suppose  that 
everything  is  lost ;  and  not  having  seen  the 
vision  or  heard  the  voice  as  the  others  have, 
they  reject  the  Bible  as  if  it  were  waste 
paper,  and  give  up  the  Church  of  God  as 
a  discredited  relic  of  the  past.  They  would 
have  had  no  excuse  for  this  had  they  not 
been  led  to  build  on  the  sand  of  theory 
instead  of  on  the  rock  of  Truth. 

Let  it  be  remembered,  however,  that 
while  the  one  supreme  authority  is  Christ 
Himself,  speaking  by  His  Spirit  not  only 
through  **  holy  men  of  old  who  spake  as  they 
were  moved  by  the  Holy  Ghost,"  but  also 


122  VERIFICATION 

directly  to  the  souls  of  those  who  truly  seek 
Him,  we  are  not  at  all  justified  in  discard- 
ing other  authorities  because  they  are  not 
supreme.  It  would  be  the  very  height  of 
pride  and  self-sufficiency  for  any  man  to  say 
to  himself,  Christ  is  my  only  teacher,  there- 
fore I  will  not  listen  to  any  one  else,  but 
build  up  my  spiritual  life  on  direct  visions  of 
Him  and  voices  from  Him  to  my  own  soul. 

It  is  the  disposition  to  look  at  things 
too  much  in  this  way  that  vitiates  the  great 
argument  of  Martineau  on  "  The  Seat  of 
Authority."  Finding  as  he  does  the  ulti- 
mate seat  of  authority  in  the  voice  of  God 
as  responded  to  by  the  human  heart  and 
conscience,  he  assumes  a  position  which 
practically  sets  aside  as  worthless  the  wit- 
ness of  prophets  and  apostles,  and  the 
accumulated  experience  and  witness  of  the 
Church.  As  we  have  seen,  it  would  be 
madness  in  ordinary  life  to  cut  ourselves 
off  from  the  past,  and  it  is  equally  foolish 
to  attempt  it  in  the  life  of  faith.  Though 
we  do  not  find  our  supreme  authority  even 
in  the  holiest  men  of  old,  or  in  any  body 
of  men  claiming  to  be  the  Church,  we  by  no 
means  discard  the  authority  which  properly 
belongs  to  them.      We  have   already  seen 


AUTHORITY  ULTIMATE  AND  PROXIMATE  123 

abundant  evidence,  and  shall  see  more  before 
we  have  done,  that  God  did  indeed  speak  to 
the  fathers  by  the  prophets,  and  has  in  these 
last  days  spoken  to  us  in  His  Son  ;  and  to 
discard  the  authority  of  these  utterances 
because  we  have  not  the  guarantee  that  every 
line  of  the  books  in  which  they  come  to  us 
is  guarded  against  the  possibility  of  error,  is 
wilfully  to  reject  the  revelation  which  God 
has  given  us,  and  on  which  alone  our  fellow- 
ship with  Him  is  based ;  and  to  pay  no 
regard  whatever  to  what  the  Spirit  has  said 
to  the  Churches  in  time  past  would  be  to 
cut  ourselves  off  from  all  the  guidance  and 
inspiration  which  has  come  through  an  in- 
numerable cloud  of  witnesses.  There  is  no 
infallible  Church  ;  but  that  does  not  mean 
that  we  deny  the  presence  of  the  Spirit  with 
His  people  all  through  the  chequered  his- 
tory of  the  Church ;  and  though  we  see  no 
grounds  for  believing  that  God  has  wrought 
a  continual  miracle  for  the  purpose  of  pre- 
serving from  all  possible  error  every  line  and 
word  of  the  Bible,  that  is  no  reason  for  calling 
in  question  the  unique  authority  with  which 
the  utterances  of  Prophets  and  Apostles  and 
the  records  of  the  Evangelists  have  come  to  us. 
There  will,  no  doubt,  be  those  who  cannot 


124  VERIFICATION 

help  thinking  it  a  serious  loss  to  give  up  the 
idea  of  a  document  so  carefully  drawn  up 
as  to  be  in  itself  a  complete  and  sufficient 
authority,  like  an  Act  of  Parliament  in 
which  the  effect  of  every  word  and  comma 
has  been  minutely  considered  beforehand, 
so  as  to  leave  nothing  to  doubtful  dispu- 
tation. What  a  comfort  it  would  be !  We 
should  need  no  interpreter,  no  light  from 
above,  there  would  be  an  end  of  all  con- 
troversy, for  liter  a  scrip  ta  manet^  while 
visions  and  voices  and  inspiration — are  they 
not  all  fugitive  and  unreal  ?  But  have 
Acts  of  Parliament  proved  so  very  satis- 
factory ?  Have  we  never  heard  of  the 
proverbial  coach-and-six  ?  And  if  it  is 
proved  by  experience  to  be  impossible  with 
the  aid  of  the  most  accomplished  parlia- 
mentary draughtsmen  and  lawyers,  to  con- 
struct in  such  a  way  as  to  leave  no  loophole 
for  evasion,  an  Act  of,  say,  twenty  pages, 
dealing  with  a  subject  of  quite  Hmited  scope 
and  application,  can  it  be  supposed  possible 
to  have  a  heavenly  Act  of  Parliament  ex- 
tending to  a  thousand  pages  and  dealing 
with  a  thousand  and  one  difficult  questions, 
constructed  in  such  a  way  as  to  be  sufficient 
in  itself  for  all  purposes  ? 


ULTIMATE  AUTHORITY  125 

Verily  we  cannot  do  without  something 
above  the  written  word,  without  the  presence 
and  guidance  of  the  Spirit  of  Him  who  spake 
to  the  fathers  by  the  prophets.  There  must 
be  present  inspiration  to  verify  for  us,  and  to 
enable  us  to  make  use  of  the  inspiration  that 
is  past.  Do  we  not  believe  in  the  Holy 
Ghost?  Do  we  wish  to  do  without  Him? 
Let  us  then,  instead  of  finding  fault  with  the 
divine  method  as  unsatisfactory,  gratefully 
accept  it,  and  let  us  with  adoring  gratitude 
rejoice  that  "  God  who  commanded  the  light 
to  shine  out  of  darkness,  hath  shined  in  our 
hearts,  to  give  the  light  of  the  knowledge 
of  the  glory  of  God  in  the  face  of  Jesus 
Christ."  There  is  the  final  verification. 
There  is  the  ultimate  authority — the  Holy 
Spirit  of  God  and  of  His  Son  Jesus  Christ 
speaking,  in  the  sacred  Scriptures  especially, 
to  the  consciences  and  hearts  of  those  who 
are  of  the  truth. 


CHAPTER   IX 
The  Way  of  Certainty 

AT  the  close  of  the  last  chapter  we 
referred  to  the  dissatisfaction  often 
expressed  with  the  view  there  presented,  on 
the  ground  that  it  seems  to  give  up  the  hope 
of  certainty  promised  both  by  an  infallible 
Church  and  an  infallible  Bible.  T*-  c.  ulc 
admitted  that  there  may  '-^  ^^nd  if  it  is 
tainty,  personal  assu'-i^^  be  impossible  with 
the  gospel,  but  -bst  accomplished  parlia- 
the  rerj^- -•:xciughtsmen  and  lawyers,  to  con- 
struct in  such  a  way  as  to  leave  no  loophole 
for  evasion,  an  Act  of,  say,  twenty  pages, 
dealing  with  a  subject  of  quite  limited  scope 
and  application,  can  it  be  supposed  possible 
to  have  a  heavenly  Act  of  Parliament  ex- 
tending to  a  thousand  pages  and  dealing 
with  a  thousand  and  one  difficult  questions, 
constructed  in  such  a  way  as  to  be  sufficient 
in  itself  for  all  purposes  ? 


WAY  OF   CERTAINTY  127 

what  He  has  actually  done.  This  will  take 
us  in  part  over  the  ground  we  have  traversed, 
but  the  matter  is  so  important  that  we  need 
not  hesitate  to  deal  with  it  in  another  con- 
nection, which  will  present  it  in  a  more 
concrete  and  illustrative  way. 

Let  it  be  observed,  in  the  first  place,  that 
there  is  no  encouragement  given  in  Scripture 
to  expect  any  such  revelation  of  truth  as 
will  dispense  with  earnest  inquiry.  We  are 
continually  reminded  throughout  the  Old 
Testament  that  we  must  seek  the  Lord, 
seek  Him  with  the  whole  heart,  must  search 
for  wisdom  as  for  hid  treasure ;  our  Lord 
Qi^  trie  V.^s^"^^  duty  with  still  greater  force, 
Christ."  Theiv}'*'^  must  ask,  seek,  knock. 
There  is  the  ultimaOto  the  strait  gate,  must 
Spirit  of  God  and  of  Hlgdureth  unto  ever- 
speaking,  in  the  sacred  Scriptures  'L^^rf^sure 
to  the  consciences  and  hearts  of  those  who 
are  of  the  truth. 


128  WAY   OF   CERTAINTY 

certainty  is  in  itself  quite  natural  and  proper, 
yet  when  it  takes  the  form  of  a  demand 
for  some  external  authority  to  settle  every- 
thing for  us  without  any  thought  or  effort 
of  our  own,  it  becomes  morbid  and  utterly 
misleading.  This  appears  continually  in  the 
case  of  those  who  in  recent  times  have  left 
the  Anglican  for  the  Roman  Church.  It  is 
seen  with  startling  distinctness  in  the  letters 
of  Cardinal  Manning,  and  it  is  no  less  marked 
in  the  "  Apologia  "  of  John  Henry  Newman. 
Both  of  them  assume  all  through  that  cer- 
tainty is  impossible  unless  there  be  an  in- 
fallible authority  to  settle  all  questions  as 
they  arise  by  word  of  mouth  or  stroke  of 
pen.  The  Scriptures  were  sufficient  for  their 
time,  but  what  are  the  people  of  this  late 
age  of  the  world  to  do  without  an  infallible 
authority  to  answer  their  questions  ?  The 
Holy  Spirit  indeed  still  lives,  but  where  is 
He,  and  how  is  His  voice  to  be  uttered  ? 
It  is  not  enough  that  He  is  infallible  Himself, 
He  must  have  an  infallible  mouthpiece,  and 
what  can  that  be  but  the  Church  of  Rome, 
and  the  Pope  who  speaks  in  its  name  ?  How 
simple  and  clear  it  all  is  now  !  an  infallible 
Church  speaking  through  an  infallible  Pope — 
no  more  doubts  or  fears,  no  more  difficulties, 


WAY  OF   CERTAINTY  129 

no  more  need  to  search  and  see  for  ourselves  ; 
it  is  all  done  for  us,  and  we  need  have  no 
more  trouble ;  all  the  faithful  may  now,  as 
the  Cardinal  expresses  it  in  one  of  his  letters, 
"  lay  down  their  weary  reason  by  the  still 
waters  of  refreshment."  Now  the  question 
is,  Is  it  indeed  the  divine  will  that  in  order 
to  attain  certainty  in  regard  to  the  truth  as 
it  is  in  Jesus,  we  are  to  lay  down  our  weary 
reason  beside  the  still  waters  of  submission 
to  a  fellow-mortal  supposed  to  be  infallible  ? 
Or  is  there  a  more  excellent  way  ? 

We  have  spoken  of  the  general  drift  and 
tenour  of  the  Scriptures ;  but  there  happens 
to  be  one  particular  passage  in  which  we  are 
permitted  to  see  the  true  method  of  reaching 
the  desired  certainty.  It  is  the  introduction 
to  St.  Luke's  Gospel,  where  the  Evangelist 
states,  as  his  object  in  writing  to  Theophilus, 
"that  thou  mightest  know  the  certainty  of 
those  things  wherein  thou  hast  been  in- 
structed." Let  us  then  inquire  what  means 
he  employed  for  the  purpose. 

Notice,  at  the  outset,  that  the  inspired 
Evangelist  had  no  expectation  that  Christian 
disciples  would  have  certainty  to  start  with. 
Theophilus  had  already  been  under  instruc- 
tion which  evidently  covered  the  wide  range 

K 


I30  WAY  OF  CERTAINTY 

of  the  life  and  teaching  of  Christ  in  the  days 
of  His  earthly  ministry;  yet  he  still  needed 
to  be  led  on  to  certainty. 

This  does  not  imply  any  uncertainty  in 
his  experience.  As  soon  as  his  heart  was 
opened  to  the  Lord  Jesus,  he  would  become 
acquainted  with  Him,  and  would  have  the 
experience  of  the  light  of  the  new  life.  But 
it  would  be  only  a  point  of  light  to  start 
with,  only  the  beginning  of  a  course  of 
instruction  in  divine  things.  As  the  circle 
enlarged,  new  questions  would  arise;  new 
difficulties ;  doubts,  possibly,  in  regard  to 
some  things ;  dim  conceptions  needing  to  be 
cleared ;  and,  in  this  way,  it  would  come  to 
pass  that,  even  after  years  of  instruction,  he 
would  still  feel  the  need  of  such  help  as  the 
Evangelist  Luke  undertook  to  give  him. 

Let  it  be  observed  that  this  point  has 
its  application  to  many  at  the  very  opposite 
pole  from  our  Roman  Catholic  friends.  Ex- 
tremes meet;  and  so  there  are  those  who 
excuse  their  neglect  of  religion  altogether  on 
the  ground  that  they  cannot  have  perfect 
certainty  to  begin  with,  in  regard  to  the 
whole  round  of  Christian  doctrine.  They 
have  their  difficulties  about  miracles,  about 
the  future  life,  about  the  course  of  nature, 


WAY  OF  CERTAINTY  131 

and  the  providence  of  God  ;  and,  because 
their  Christian  friends  cannot  clear  these  all 
up  to  them,  in  the  space  of  ten  minutes  or 
half  an  hour,  they  will  not  listen  to  anything 
our  Lord  and  Master  has  to  say.  Now,  no 
one  denies,  no  thoughtful  person  can  deny, 
that,  in  the  doctrines  of  Christianity,  touch- 
ing, as  they  do,  on  every  side  the  hardest 
subjects  on  which  the  mind  of  man  can 
exercise  itself,  there  are  many  and  great 
difficulties.  What  then  ?  Is  it  reasonable 
to  insist  that  the  whole  round  of  Christian 
truth  should  lie  in  the  clear  light  of  know- 
ledge and  certainty  to  the  mere  beginner? 
What  should  we  think  of  a  person  who 
refused  to  begin  the  study  of  elementary 
geometry  and  algebra,  because  he  could  not 
see  through  the  intricacies  of  the  integral 
and  differential  calculus  ?  Yet  there  are 
thousands  who  decline  to  enter  the  school 
of  Christ,  for  reasons  of  precisely  the  same 
kind.  All  that  is  asked  is,  to  turn  from  all 
that  conscience  tells  them  is  sin,  and  open 
their  hearts  to  God  that  He  may  let  His 
light  shine  in  upon  them  as  they  read  the 
Scriptures  or  hear  the  gospel,  and  keep  them 
open  to  Him  that  more  and  more  light  may 
shine  day  by  day  ;  and  when,  in  the  course  of 


132  WAY   OF   CERTAINTY 

their  training,  they  come  to  places  where 
they  meet  with  serious  difficulty,  they  will, 
no  doubt,  find  some  such  help  as  that  which 
was  ready  for  Theophilus  when  he  needed 
it — making  clear  what  formerly  was  dark,  and 
helping  onwards  towards  that  certainty,  in 
regard  to  the  full-orbed  truth  of  God,  which 
is  to  be  the  goal,  not  the  starting  point,  of 
our  race.  What  is  asked  of  them  is,  not  that 
they  give  their  assent  to  any  ready-made 
creed,  but  that  they  humble  themselves 
before  God,  take  their  place  in  the  school  of 
Christ,  as  beginners,  and  be  content  to  learn 
by  degrees,  as  He  will  teach  them. 

So  much  for  the  negative  part  of  our  sub- 
ject :  certainty  is  not  waiting  for  us  ready 
made  at  the  start ;  it  must  be  attained,  and 
the  question  is.  How  }  By  what  means  ?  Is 
there  any  hint  given  to  Theophilus  of  the 
suppression  of  his  faculties  being  needed, 
or  their  coercion  by  sheer  authority?  The 
writer  has  not  the  smallest  doubt  that  the 
Evangelist  Luke  wrote  this  gospel  as  he 
was  moved  by  the  Holy  Ghost,  and  that, 
therefore,  it  is  an  authoritative  presentation 
of  the  truth  in  Jesus;  but  mark  well  that 
St.  Luke  does  not  say  one  word  about  this, 
or  even  give  the  slightest  hint  of  it.     He 


WAY  OF  CERTAINTY  133 

does  not  say,  These  other  teachers  to  whom 
you  have  been  listening  are  not  infallible,  but 
I  am;  so  you  must  believe  what  I  say  on 
peril  of  your  salvation.  Not  a  trace  of  this. 
He  refers  to  many  others  who  have  taken 
in  hand  to  tell  the  Gospel  story.  There 
must  have  have  been  some  of  these  attempts, 
which,  however  well  meant  and  well  done, 
never  found  their  way  into  the  canon  of 
Scripture.  Our  Fourth  Gospel  could  not 
have  been  among  them,  for  it  was  consider- 
ably later ;  and  if  Matthew  and  Mark  were, 
they  could  only  have  been  two  of  the 
"many"  to  whom  he  refers.  Yet,  observe, 
he  does  not  distinguish  among  those  who 
have  taken  the  work  in  hand,  nor  does  he 
discredit  any  of  the  rest  in  his  own  favour  ; 
and  when  he  speaks  of  the  qualifications  he 
has  for  the  task,  what  does  he  specify  ?  Is 
there  anything  about  his  being  specially 
appointed  to  give  an  ex  cathedra  utterance  ? 
Not  a  word  of  it.  Here  are  the  claims  he 
makes  on  his  own  behalf:  that  he  has  given 
much  attention  to  the  subject,  that  he  has 
been  careful  to  be  accurate  in  verifying  his 
facts,  and  that  he  makes  a  special  effort  to 
to  be  orderly  in  the  presentation  of  them. 
Not  only  so,  but  he  even  avoids  any  such 


134  WAY  OF  CERTAINTY 

phrase  as  is  common  enough  among  good 
people  of  our  day  who  have  no  claim  to 
special  inspiration.  He  does  not  say,  **  The 
Spirit  moved  me  to  write  this  to  you  " ;  or, 
"  I  have  been  led  to  write  this  Gospel  "  ;  he 
does  not  even  go  to  the  length  of  saying, 
"It  has  been  borne  in  upon  me  that  I  should 
write  this  to  you ; "  he  simply  says,  "It 
seemed  good  to  me  also." 

Does  all  this  lessen  reasonable  faith  in  his 
inspiration?  On  the  contrary,  it  increases 
it.  It  is  your  uninspired  men  and  Churches 
who  wish  to  compel  faith  by  mere  authority. 
Instead  of  taking  the  claim  of  infallibility 
as  the  note  of  the  true  Church,  as  Newman 
and  Manning  did,  and  their  followers  do,  we 
recognize  in  it  a  mark  of  its  departure  from 
the  simplicity  and  purity  of  the  early  days. 
If  only  these  good  men  had  given  less  atten- 
tion to  the  mediaeval  fathers  and  more  to 
the  Holy  Scriptures,  they  would  have  seen 
that  the  absence  of  such  claims  was  much 
more  in  accord  with  real  inspiration. 

But  it  may  be  suggested  that  the  absence 
of  the  claim  to  infallibility  on  the  part  of  the 
Evangelist  was  simply  due  to  his  modesty. 
Well,  no  doubt  St.  Luke  was  an  exceedingly 
modest  man,  and  that  is  the  reason  why  he 


WAY  OF  CERTAINTY  135 

never  mentions  his  own  name,  either  here 
or  in  the  Acts  of  the  Apostles,  but  always 
hides  himself  behind  his  subject.  Is  not  that 
a  modesty  well  worthy  of  imitation  ?  If  only 
the  Roman  Church  would  cease  to  hide  Christ 
behind  itself,  and  begin  to  hide  itself  behind 
Christ,  as  all  the  Evangelists  did,  what  a 
glorious  Reformation  there  would  be  ! 

But  there  was  more  than  modesty  in 
Luke's  suppression  of  all  claim  to  speak 
with  the  authority  of  divine  inspiration. 
It  was  part  of  his  inspiration,  guarding  him 
against  deviating  from  the  divine  method 
of  dealing  with  human  souls.  Education, 
not  dictation,  is  the  divine  method.  Every 
intelligent  reader  of  the  Scriptures  now 
recognizes  the  truth  of  what  Lessing  first 
distinctly  taught — that  the  Old  Testament 
is  the  record  of  the  divine  education  of 
Israel.  And  to  come  closer  home,  look  at 
Christ's  training  of  the  Twelve.  Is  there 
any  sign  of  the  imposing  on  their  minds  by 
mere  authority  of  a  fully  developed  creed  ? 
He  lays  down  duties  with  authority,  as  in 
the  Sermon  on  the  Mount ;  but  not  doctrines. 
Take,  as  a  palmary  illustration,  the  doctrine 
of  His  divinity.  Can  we  discover  any 
attempt  to  impose  it  on  them  by  authority  ? 


136  WAY   OF   CERTAINTY 

On  the  contrary,  He  deliberately  withholds 
it  till  they  discover  it  for  themselves.  "  Come 
and  see"  is  one  of  His  earliest  utterances  to 
His  disciples.  So  He  waits  until  they  see  it 
for  themselves.  He  hears  them  say  to  one 
another,  *'  What  manner  of  man  is  this  ! " 
and  we  do  not  find  Him  answering,  "You 
are  mistaken  in  thinking;  of  Me  as  a  man 
merely ;  I  am  the  Son  of  God,  and  you 
must  believe  it."  Nothing  of  the  sort.  He 
waits  until  they  see  it.  And  not  until  He 
has  some  reason  to  believe  that  they  have 
caught  sight  of  the  great  truth  for  them- 
selves— though  it  took  them  nearly  three 
years  to  get  that  length — not  till  then  does 
He  begin  to  draw  them  out  by  asking,  as 
He  did  at  Ceesarea  Philippi,  "  Whom  do  ye 
say  that  I  am  ?  "  And  if  we  will  think  at 
all  carefully  on  the  subject,  we  shall  see  that 
truth  imposed  by  mere  authority  is  of  no 
use ;  it  must  be  welcomed  by  the  spiritual 
nature,  taken  into  its  substance,  assimilated 
by  thought  and  feeling,  before  it  can  do  its 
proper  work. 

The  work  of  the  Spirit  was  to  be  con- 
ducted in  the  same  way.  "  He  shall  guide 
you  into  all  truth  " — a  process  of  education 
still,  in  which  the  faculties  are  to   be  fully 


WAY  OF   CERTAINTY  137 

employed  about  the  truth  till  it  becomes 
luminous  and  full-orbed,  shining  with  its  own 
light,  and  so  giving  that  certainty  for  which 
we  rightly  crave,  and  which  is  a  great  and 
blessed  attainment  when  reached  in  the 
proper  way,  so  clearly  marked  out  for  us 
in  the  Scriptures  of  truth. 

"  There  is  no  royal  road  to  learning." 
There  is  no  short  cut  to  certainty.  "  Then 
shall  we  know,  if  we  follow  on  to  know  the 
Lord."  **  I  follow  after,  if  that  I  may  appre- 
hend that  for  which  I  also  am  apprehended 
of  Christ  Jesus."  We  cannot  dispense  with 
the  use  of  the  faculties  with  which  our 
Creator  has  endowed  us.  We  must  search 
the  Scriptures,  according  to  the  word  of 
Christ.  We  must  prove  all  things,  and  hold 
fast  that  which  is  good,  according  to  the 
word  of  St.  Paul.  We  must  not  believe  every 
spirit,  as  the  Apostle  John  puts  it,  but  prove 
the  spirits  whether  they  are  of  God.  We 
must  return  from  all  wanderings  to  Christ, 
whom  the  Apostle  Peter  calls  **  the  Shepherd 
and  Bishop  of  our  souls." 

Yes,  we  have  an  infallible  Guide,  but  He 
is  no  poor,  frail,  erring  creature  like  you  or 
me,  or  the  Pope  of  Rome.  We  have  Christ 
Himself,  "the  Shepherd  and  Bishop  of  our 


138  WAY  OF  CERTAINTY 

souls,"  who  has  promised  never  to  fail  us 
nor  forsake  us.  We  have  the  Holy  Spirit, 
to  come  and  take  possession  of  our  hearts, 
to  quicken,  not  to  deaden,  all  our  faculties,  to 
give  us  the  light  of  the  knowledge  of  the 
glory  of  God  in  the  face  of  Jesus  Christ. 
And,  as  the  Apostle  John  puts  it,  "The 
anointing  which  we  received  of  Him  abideth 
in  you,  and  ye  need  not  that  any  one  teach 
you ;  but  as  His  anointing  teacheth  you  all 
things  and  is  true,  and  is  no  lie,  and  even 
as  it  taught  you,  abide  in  Him."  What  a 
distinct  warning  against  those  who  seek  in- 
fallibility in  man !  Assurance,  i.e.  certainty, 
is  the  keynote  of  the  Epistle,  and  here  the 
Apostle  of  Certainty  distinctly  points  us  to 
the  Spirit  of  God  as  the  only  and  all- 
sufficient  Guide.  **  Ye  need  not  that  any 
one  teach  you."  What  does  that  mean  } 
It  cannot  mean  that  all  teaching  is  to  stop, 
that  churches  are  to  be  closed,  Sunday 
Schools  shut,  books  burned,  even  Bibles 
destroyed,  and  nothing  left  but  the  voice 
of  the  Holy  Spirit  in  the  heart.  It  means 
that  there  is  no  authoritative  teacher  except 
the  Holy  Spirit;  it  means  that  if  we  want 
infallibility  we  must  not  seek  it  in  man,  but 
in  God  alone ;   and  if  we  ask  how  it  is  to 


WAY  OF  CERTAINTY  139 

be  conveyed  to  us,  it  is  by  that  anointing, 
as  he  calls  it,  which  abides  in  the  recesses 
of  the  soul. 

We   must  certainly  use  all  the  means  of 
grace,  especially  the  reading  of  the  sacred 
Scriptures ;  for  that  was  the  means  on  which 
the    Evangelist    Luke    relied.      Theophilus 
would  need  the  guidance  and  instruction  of 
the  Holy  Spirit,  but  that  did  not  dispense 
with  the  necessity  of  carefully  reading  this 
Gospel.     We  see,  then,  how  clear  and  dis- 
tinct is  the  answer  of  the  Scripture  to  the 
question  with  which  we  started.     We  cannot 
expect  certainty  in  regard  to  every  word  of 
the    Bible  and   the   whole   circle   of  divine 
truth  to  start  with ;  but  we  may  expect  in 
due  time  to  attain  to  the  full-orbed  truth  of 
God   in  Christ  through  the  reading  of  the 
sacred  Scriptures  under  the  light  and  guidance 
of  the  Holy  Spirit. 


PART   III 

INSPIRATION  AND  AUTHORITY  OF 
THE  RECORD 


CHAPTER  X 

Introductory 

WE  have,  in  a  certain  sense,  reached  our 
goal.  We  have  had  an  inspired 
people,  a  prophet  nation,  called  of  God  to 
receive  from  Him  and  to  transmit  to  us  a 
revelation  of  Himself  and  of  the  Gospel  of 
salvation  which  shines  out  in  their  literature, 
and  culminates  in  the  wonderful  story  of  the 
Redeemer  of  the  world  ;  and  we  have  all 
this  coming  to  us,  not  as  a  mere  story  of  the 
past,  but  as  an  authentic  revelation  of  God, 
valid  here  and  now — His  voice  heard,  His 
presence  felt,  the  power  of  His  salvation 
known  to  those  who  open  mind  and  heart 
to  the  great  unveiling.  Already  we  have  had 
good  reason  to  be  assured,  to  use  the  words 
of  the  sixth  of  the  Thirty- Nine  Articles, 
"  of  the  sufficiency  of  the  Holy  Scriptures 
for  salvation." 

But   it   may    be   said,  the  gospel  is  only 
143 


144  INSPIRATION 

a  line  of  light  running  through  the  Scrip- 
tures. Are  we  to  restrict  their  inspiration 
and  authority  to  that  one  line  ?  Are  not 
the  Scriptures,  as  a  whole,  inspired  by  God, 
and  invested  with  divine  authority  ?  If  so, 
must  we  not  claim  that  complete  exemption 
from  human  frailty  and  liability  to  error 
which  seems  involved  in  the  idea  of  divine 
authority  ?  It  is  to  this  part  of  the  subject 
we  must  now  address  ourselves,  namely,  the 
inspiration  and  authority  of  the  record  of 
divine  revelation  in  the  Scriptures  of  the 
Old  and  New  Testament. 

Here  again  we  believe  that  if  we  faithfully 
follow  our  method  of  not  settling  in  our 
mind  what  ought  to  be,  but  finding  out 
what  is,  we  shall  have  reason  to  wonder 
and  adore,  as  we  see  how  our  Father  in 
heaven  has  secured  for  us  all  the  blessings 
of  inspired  guidance  under  conditions  which 
seemed  almost  to  preclude  the  possibility  of 
it.  We  shall  find  that  He  has  made  the 
very  most  of  the  materials  with  which  alone 
it  was  possible  for  Him  to  work,  with  the 
result  that  though  the  treasure  is  in  earthen 
vessels,  which  serve  as  a  foil  to  set  off  its 
incomparable  value,  the  very  vessels  them- 
selves,  earthen   as   they  are,    and   must   of 


OF  THE  RECORD  145 

necessity  be,  are  such  that  there  too  we 
cannot  but  recognize  the  divine  workman- 
ship. We  shall  see  further  that,  though 
we  cannot  claim  perfection  for  any  of  the 
organs  or  vehicles  of  inspiration,  save  for 
Him  to  whom  they  all  bear  converging 
witness,  the  result  of  the  whole,  as  seen  in 
our  completed  Bible,  may  be  said  to  be 
perfect — not  as  literature,  nor  as  art,  nor  as 
history,  nor  (least  of  all)  as  science — but  as 
adapted  to  the  accomplishment  of  its  end, 
perfect  in  the  sense  suggested  by  the 
Psalmist  when  he  says  :  "  The  law  of  the 
Lord  is  perfect,  converting  the  soul ;  the 
testimony  of  the  Lord  is  sure,  making  wise 
the  simple."  To  see  the  marvel  of  all  this 
it  will  be  necessary  first  to  take  into  some- 
what careful  consideration  the  necessary 
limitations  of  inspiration  under  the  con- 
ditions of  its  exercise. 


CHAPTER   XI 
Necessary  Limitations — **  Earthen  Vessels** 

IT  is  important  at  the  outset  to  remember 
that  the  most  consummate  artist  is 
limited  by  the  nature  of  his  material.  He 
may  have  thoughts  and  inspirations  far 
above  and  beyond  what  he  can  express  in 
black-and-white  or  in  colours,  in  marble 
or  in  bronze,  in  speech  or  in  song;  but 
however  perfect  his  idea  may  be,  it  must, 
in  finding  expression,  share  the  imper- 
fections of  the  forms  in  which  he  works. 
If  this  very  obvious  fact  had  only  been 
kept  in  mind,  most  of  the  difficulties  which 
beset  the  subject  of  inspiration  need  never 
have  arisen. 

There  are  some  people  who  find  it  diffi- 
cult, or  as  it  would  seem  almost  impossible, 
to  realize  that  God,  the  omnipotent,  all-per- 
fect One,  should  have  been  under  similar 
limitations  in  the  giving  of  His  revelation 
146 


sii 


NECESSARY  LIMITATIONS  147 

to  the  human  race.  They  suppose  that 
with  His  limitless  resources  He  would 
surely  have  found  it  easy  to  give  a  perfect 
revelation  to  the  most  imperfect  people. 
But  have  these  friends  ever  in  seriousness 
raised  the  question  how  it  could  have  been 
done  ?  Let  us  take  some  of  the  common 
suppositions. 

Let  us  suppose  it  possible  that  a  document 
could  be  constructed  in  heaven  v/hich  would 
have  been  a  perfect  revelation  of  the  truth, 
the  whole  truth,  and  nothing  but  the  truth, 
desirable  for  man  to  know  on  all  the  subjects 
which  concern  him  here  and  hereafter. 
What  mortal  could  have  read  it  ?  For  it 
must  have  been  in  a  perfect  language  ;  and 
there  never  has  been  any  such  language 
upon  earth,  so  it  must  have  been  in  an 
unknown  tongue.  And  even  if  that  diffi- 
culty had  been  overcome,  which  of  the 
sons  of  men  would  have  been  capable  of 
seeing  and  understanding  and  appreciating 
the  authentic  product  of  heaven's  high 
literature  ?  There  would  need  to  have  been 
not  only  a  miraculously  constructed  book, 
but  a  miraculously  reconstructed  humanity 
to  take  it  in  ;  and  wherein  would  that  have 
been  different  from  the  annihilation  of  the 


148  NECESSARY   LIMITATIONS 

human  race  as  it  is,  and  the  creating  of 
another  ?  It  would  not  have  been  the 
salvation  of  man ;  it  would  have  been  the 
sweeping  of  him  out  of  existence,  and 
the  bringing  into  being  of  a  new  race 
entirely  different  from  the  old. 

Again,  let  us  suppose  it  possible  that  He 
could  have  sent  an  angel  from  heaven,  or 
a  whole  army  of  angels,  fully  inspired  with 
heavenly  truth,  to  go  forth  as  missionaries 
and  make  known  the  heavenly  revelation  to 
all  sorts  and  conditions  of  men.  But,  once 
again,  what  language  would  they  use  ?  As 
soon  as  they  employed  any  language  under 
the  sun,  that  moment  would  their  message 
be  involved  in  the  imperfections — crudities, 
barbarisms,  inconsistencies,  obscurities,  and 
what  not — inseparable  from  the  very  best 
of  earth's  languages.  And,  if  it  be  supposed 
that  it  might  be  possible  for  them  to  supple- 
ment the  words  they  spoke  by  the  lives  they 
lived,  would  they  not  be  out  of  touch  with 
us,  and  would  it  not  be  quite  impossible  for 
us  to  enter  into  lives  so  wholly  diverse  in 
nature  and  in  circumstance  from  ours  ? 
And,  if  they  came  upon  us  with  the  impact 
of  superhuman  power,  would  not  human 
freedom  be  abolished  ? 


EARTHEN  VESSELS  149 

It  has  been  a  not  uncommon  rhetorical 
device,  in  speaking  of  the  gospel  as  coming 
to  us  through  human  agency,  to  say  that 
God  might  have  spoken  to  us  with  a  voice 
from  heaven,  or  He  might  have  written 
His  gospel  in  letters  of  light  on  the  sky,  or 
He  might  have  sent  a  legion  of  angels  to 
tell  it  all  abroad ;  but  He  has,  in  His 
condescending  goodness,  set  these  other 
methods  aside  and  employed  the  agency  of 
man.  But  will  such  flights  of  rhetoric  bear 
any  examination  ?  Try  to  think  the  alter- 
natives out.  Imagine  the  writing  on  the 
sky ;  imagine  the  voice  or  succession  of 
voices  from  an  open  heaven  ;  imagine  the 
legion  of  angels  setting  to  work — is  there 
one  of  the  inherent  difficulties  of  the  case 
really  met  ?  What  really  stands  in  the  way 
of  salvation  is  sin.  And  it  is  not  so  very 
easy  a  matter  to  take  away  the  sin  of  the 
world,  to  give  eternal  life  to  dying  men  ! 

The  more  we  apply  our  minds  to  think 
out  the  mighty  problem  of  the  divine  reve- 
lation to  a  sinful  race,  the  more  clearly  shall 
we  see  that  God's  method  is,  if  not  the  only 
one,  most  certainly  the  best ;  always  on  the 
supposition  that  human  freedom  is  not  to 
be  interfered  with. 


ISO  NECESSARY  LIMITATIONS 

Setting  aside,  then,  other  suggested  alter- 
natives, let  us  look  at  the  method  which  God 
actually  followed,  and  consider  some  of  the 
limitations  from  which  there  could  be  no 
escape. 

(i)  If  man's  free  agency  is  to  be  respected, 
he  must  be  reached,  not  by  an  intrusive 
force  from  without,  but  by  the  usual  methods 
of  influence  and  persuasion  by  which  the  will 
is  reached  without  coercion.  Hence  the 
need  of  human  agency.  And  the  agency 
must  not  only  be  human,  but  must  remain 
human.  To  take  an  ordinary  man  and  by 
divine  fiat  to  transform  him  into  an  angel 
or  some  perfect  creature  quite  unlike  what 
he  was,  would  be  practically  to  surrender 
human  ministration,  and  fall  back  on  what 
would  be,  to  all  intents  and  purposes,  pre- 
ternatural agency.  There  is  an  influence  of 
the  divine  Spirit  upon  the  human  spirit, 
which  lies  within  the  range  of  what  is 
natural,  and  whenever  we  have  the  oppor- 
tunity of  following  the  training  which  made 
a  prophet  or  an  apostle  of  the  originally 
ordinary  man,  we  can  see  by  what  gradual 
and  sometimes  painful  processes  the  result 
was  reached.     We  think  of  Moses  and  all 


HUMAN  AGENCY  151 

that  he  went  through  before  he  could  become 
the  leader  of  the  people ;  of  Elijah  and  his 
trials  and  temptations ;  of  Hosea  and  the  sad 
story  of  his  domestic  life ;  of  Jeremiah  and 
the  sore  suffering,  and  still  sorer  soul- 
conflicts  by  which  he  became  the  most 
Christ-like  of  all  the  prophets.  So  too  the 
Apostles — think  of  the  long  course  of  train- 
ing they  had ;  compare  Peter  and  John  of 
the  early  days  with  the  men  they  had  become 
when  they  wrote  their  epistles  :  they  are  new 
men,  but  not  by  a  divine  fiat,  not  by  a 
sudden  miracle  of  transformation,  simply  by 
the  training  of  Christ  and  His  Spirit  in  ways 
which  never  interfered  with  the  freedom  of 
their  will,  or  the  natural  evolution  of  their 
manhood,  under  the  gracious  influence  of 
which  they  were  the  subjects.  It  might, 
perhaps,  be  thought  that  the  case  of  the 
Apostle  Paul  was  an  exception.  Was  not 
he  miraculously  changed  from  one  being  to 
another  in  that  flash  of  light  from  heaven, 
and  may  that  not  be  taken  as  an  illustration 
of  how  God  not  only  could,  but  did,  in  a 
moment  and  simply  by  the  exercise  of  divine 
power,  undo  one  man,  the  old  Saul,  and 
create  a  new  one,  the  new  Paul  ?  Is  not 
that  what  Paul  himself  felt  when  he  wrote 


152  NECESSARY  LIMITATIONS 

of  being  in  Christ,  as  a  "new  creation"? 
But  when  we  look  more  closely  into  his  case, 
we  find  that  it  was  no  real  exception  to  the 
rule.  There  was,  indeed,  a  sudden  change 
from  darkness  to  light,  but  we  must  not 
forget  his  presence  some  time  before  at  the 
martyrdom  of  Stephen,  and  the  impression 
which  would  be  made  upon  him  by  what  he 
there  saw  and  heard ;  nor  must  we  forget 
the  opportunity  he  would  have  on  the  long 
journey  North  to  review  his  past,  and  to  raise 
the  great  question  of  his  life  ;  and,  moreover, 
while  there  was,  as  so  often  happens,  a  quite 
sudden  conversion,  there  was  no  suddenness 
in  his  appointment  to  the  position  of  apostle. 
He  had  not  only  to  put  himself  under  the 
guidance  of  Ananias,  and  in  communication 
with  the  brethren  at  Jerusalem,  but  to  spend 
three  years  in  the  desert.  Even  in  his  case, 
therefore,  there  is  no  evidence  of  such  a 
miraculous  influence  upon  him  as  would  lift 
him  above  the  possibility  of  error.  That  he 
was  an  inspired  man  thereafter  there  can  be 
no  manner  of  doubt,  and  that  his  inspiration 
was  far  more  than  what  we  call  the  ordinary 
guidance  of  the  Spirit ;  but  even  in  his 
case  it  was  not  such  as  to  interfere  with 
the  natural  working  of  mind  and  heart,  and 


HUMAN   LANGUAGE  153 

SO  reduce  him  to  a  mere  organ  of  another's 
inspiration.  We  conclude,  therefore,  that 
while  there  was  special  guidance  of  the 
Spirit  for  the  prophets  of  the  Old  Testament 
and  the  apostles  of  the  New,  its  action  was 
not  in  superseding  their  own  powers,  but 
rather  in  directing  and  quickening  them ;  it 
was  never  such  as  to  change  them  suddenly 
from  imperfection  to  perfection.  This  would 
have  been  to  exceed  the  necessary  limita- 
tions in  two  ways,  first  by  coercing  the 
will,  and  next  by  changing  the  man  into  a 
superman — a  virtual  abandonment  of  genuine 
human  agency. 

(2)  Another  necessary  limitation  was  the 
use  of  human  language,  and  of  such  lan- 
guage, however  undeveloped,  as  there  was 
to  be  had  at  the  time.  The  Hebrew  tongue 
was  probably  quite  as  good  as  any  of  the 
earlier  languages  of  the  world.  There  is 
a  simplicity,  directness,  and  impressiveness 
about  it  which  made  it  in  some  degree 
suitable  as  a  vehicle  of  revelation  in  its 
earlier  stages ;  but  it  was  certainly  crude, 
and  very  limited  in  its  scope.  The  Greek 
language  was  the  most  perfect  vehicle  of 
thought  in  existence  at  the  time  the  New 


154  NECESSARY  LIMITATIONS 

Testament  was  produced ;  but  even  the  best 
of  Greek  was  quite  inadequate  for  giving 
perfect  expression  to  the  things  of  God. 
New  words  had  to  be  introduced,  old  ones 
transfigured,  and  some  lifted  out  of  the  mud 
in  which  they  had  long  lain  to  be  minted 
and  coined  anew.  The  inadequacy  of 
vocabulary  is  only  a  small  part  of  the  case. 
All  who  have  studied  the  science  of  lan- 
guage know  that  it  is  a  great  mistake  to 
suppose  that  there  can  be  any  real  pre- 
cision in  expressing  even  the  most  familiar 
thoughts  in  the  region  of  the  intellect,  and 
that  it  is  only  by  way  of  suggestion  that 
the  unseen  and  eternal  can  be  presented 
at  all.  We  use,  for  example,  such  simple 
and  common  words  as  "faith"  and  "love" 
as  if  they  had  a  definite  and  precise  mean- 
ing; whereas  if  we  could  analyze  the  ideas 
awakened  in  the  minds  of  different  people, 
we  should  find  scarcely  two  of  them  in 
which  they  completely  corresponded. 

One  thinks  here  of  the  classic  passage 
in  "  The  Autocrat  of  the  Breakfast  Table," 
showing  that  there  are  at  least  six  distinct 
personalities  to  be  recognized  as  taking  part 
in  the  dialogue  between  John  and  Thomas  : 
**  The  real  John,  known  only  to  his  Maker ; 


LITERARY  FORM  155 

John's  Ideal  John,  never  the  real  John,  and 
often  very  unlike  him ;  Thomas'  ideal  John, 
never  the  real  John,  nor  John's  John,  and 
often  very  unlike  either " ;  and  the  three 
Thomases  in  like  manner.  In  the  same 
way,  it  would  be  very  interesting,  and  most 
instructive  too,  if  we  could  follow  some 
controversy,  say  on  "faith,"  or  on  "the 
Atonement,"  and  discover  in  how  many 
senses  the  same  word  was  used  by  different 
persons.  We  should  probably  find  nearer 
thirty  ** faiths"  than  three,  and  as  many  as 
fifty  different  "atonements."  The  human 
mind  being  what  it  is,  there  is  endless  room 
for  misunderstanding;  and  language,  being 
one  of  its  products,  cannot  rise  above  its 
source.  It  follows,  therefore,  that  there  is 
a  necessary  limitation  with  respect  to  the 
giving  of  revelation  in  the  impossibility, 
from  the  nature  of  the  case,  of  finding  a 
better  vehicle  for  it  than  any  of  the  lan- 
guages of  man.  And  while  all  this  applies 
to  spoken  language,  it  is  still  more  marked 
as  applied  to  written  language,  which  is 
destitute  of  the  tones  and  inflections  that 
help  us  so  much  in  our  ordinary  speech. 

(3)  The  limitations  of  literary  form.    Here 


iS6  NECESSARY   LIMITATIONS 

again  it  is  quite  possible  to  conceive  of  God 
so  lifting  men  out  of  the  environment  of 
their  time  as  to  enable  them  to  make  use 
of  the  very  best  and  most  accurate  forms 
of  literature,  even  such  as  in  the  natural 
course  were  not  developed  till  thousands  of 
years  later.  Even  these  would  have  had 
their  own  imperfections  ;  besides,  in  order  to 
reach  that  higher  stage  of  literary  form,  it 
is  plain  that  such  a  miracle  would  have  been 
required  as  to  unman  a  man,  to  deprive  him 
of  his  human  nature  and  make  him  a  super- 
human automaton.  No  free  will  could  have 
been  left  to  him  after  such  treatment. 

But  apart  from  this,  is  it  not  evident  that 
there  has  been  no  imposing  of  a  special  literary 
form  on  the  inspired  writers  .-*  Each  takes 
his  own,  and  of  course  it  is  a  form  current 
in  his  own  times.  It  was  "at  sundry  times 
and  in  divers  manners"  that  the  different 
portions  of  the  Bible  came  into  existence ; 
and  it  is  one  of  the  most  interesting  things 
about  the  Bible  that  there  is  scarcely  any 
form  of  literary  production  which  does  not 
find  its  place  there.  The  literary  forms  of 
the  world  in  use  at  the  different  times  are 
taken  just  as  they  are ;  only  they  are  lifted, 
as  it  were,  above  themselves,  and,  without 


LITERARY  FORM  157 

any  violation  of  their  proper  nature,  made 
vehicles  of  the  most  marvellous  inspiration. 

The  first  form  which  is  found  in  the  history 
of  the  world's  literature  is  that  of  myth  and 
legend.  Now,  there  are  those  in  our  day 
who  think  that  God  must  have  found  it  quite 
impossible  to  make  any  use  of  that  kind  of 
literature.  But  why  ?  From  this  unworthy 
and  unwarrantable  limitation  of  the  grace  and 
power  of  God  have  sprung  many  of  the  most 
serious  difficulties  as  to  the  inspiration  of  the 
Scriptures — difficulties  which  are  all  swept 
away  as  soon  as  we  recognize  that  just  as 
God  will  graciously  use  the  most  imperfect 
languages — languages  which  have  not  even 
a  word  that  will  stand  for  God  in  them,  lan- 
guages like  those  of  Patagonia  and  Northern 
Australia,  reflecting  the  condition  of  people 
who  have  scarcely  a  thought  above  the  daily 
wants  of  the  body  and  the  most  elementary 
passions  of  the  soul — for  conveying  whatever 
is  possible  of  the  truth  ;  so  he  would  use 
forms  of  literature,  however  inadequate,  rather 
than  let  the  people  go  without  any  enlighten- 
ment at  all.  If  we  would  only  think  our- 
selves back  to  the  conditions  of  the  olden 
time,  so  far  from  finding  fault  or  suggesting 
difficulty,  we  should  recognize  the  marvellous 


158  NECESSARY  LIMITATIONS 

grace  of  God  in  so  lifting  up  the  best  legendary 
literature  of  the  world  as  to  make  it  a  vehicle 
of  high  and  pure  revelation.  How  impressive 
it  is,  for  example,  to  compare  the  story  of 
the  garden  of  Eden  or  of  the  Fall  with  the 
uninspired  legends  of  other  nations,  which 
are  tissues  for  the  most  part  of  meaningless 
absurdities,  sometimes  of  abominations,  while 
the  Bible  stories  are  filled  full,  as  full  as  such 
forms  of  literature  could  be  imagined  to  be, 
of  the  noblest  spiritual  teaching !  What  an 
exhilarating  change  to  those  of  us  who  once 
were  harassed  by  the  old  difficulties,  and 
worried  with  the  fruitless  and  foolish  con- 
troversies about  them,  to  get  a  view  of  the 
glorious  heaven  which,  unclouded  by  any  of 
them,  overarches  all !  That  which  on  the  old 
view  told  so  heavily  against  the  inspiration 
of  the  Bible,  tells  powerfully  in  its  favour 
now.  It  is  a  fresh  witness  to  the  reality  and 
efficacy  of  that  touch  upon  the  spirits  of  holy 
men  of  old  which,  without  interfering  with 
their  freedom  or  overbearing  their  human 
nature,  enabled  them  to  give  us  light  in  the 
darkness,  the  rainbow  in  the  cloud — all  of 
the  truth  which  was  communicable  through 
the  only  vehicle  then  available  for  use. 

At  the  best  the  treasure  must  be  in  earthen 


LITERARY  FORM  159 

vessels,  and  the  farther  back  we  go,  the  more 
earthen  may  we  expect  the  vessel  to  be ; 
and  this  will,  of  course,  apply  in  a  very  special 
manner  to  the  time  when  myth  and  legend 
held  the  field ;  but  surely,  instead  of  making 
this  a  ground  of  complaint,  or  of  unworthy 
criticism,  we  should  rather  adore  the  wisdom 
and  grace  of  God  that  He  could  and  did  put 
the  treasure  into  any  vessel,  however  earthen, 
which  was  available ;  and  do  we  not  in  this 
see  further  evidence  that  the  excellency  of 
the  power  was  not  of  man,  but  of  God  ?  But 
this  is  of  such  commanding  importance  that 
we  must  give  it  a  chapter  to  itself. 


CHAPTER   XII 
The  Excellency  of  the  Power 

IT  is  encouraging  to  the  writer,  on  referring 
to  the  quotation  just  made  (2  Corin- 
thians iv.  7),  to  find  that  he  has  been  uncon- 
sciously following  the  order  of  the  Apostle's 
thought  in  the  passage  which  leads  up  to  that 
quotation.  If  we  turn  to  the  chapter  we 
shall  find  that  he  begins  by  speaking  of  the 
truth,  which  he  is  called,  as  a  minister  of 
Christ,  to  commend  to  every  man's  con- 
science in  the  sight  of  God  (vers,  i,  2).  This 
truth  he  identifies  with  the  Gospel  (ver.  3) ; 
and  in  view  of  its  being  hid  from  those  who 
believe  not,  he  cites  as  the  explanation  of 
this,  not  any  uncertainty  due  to  the  lack  of 
external  authority,  but  blindness  of  mind 
(ver.  4),  and  appeals  for  the  verification  of 
his  Gospel,  not  to  external  supports,  refusing 
even  to  press  upon  them  his  own  personal 

or    official    authority   (ver.    5),    but    to   the 
160 


POWER  OF  THE  WORD  i6i 

self-evidencing  power  of  the  truth  —  the 
shining  of  the  light  of  the  Gospel  as  verified 
in  Christian  experience  (ver.  6).  Then  follows 
the  acknowledgment  that  this  "  treasure " 
("the  word  of  God,"  "the  truth,"  "our 
Gospel,"  "the  glorious  Gospel  of  Christ," 
"the  light  of  the  knowledge  of  the  glory 
of  God  in  the  face  of  Jesus  Christ " — all 
equivalent  expressions  already  used)  is 
in  "  earthen  vessels "  ;  but  instead  of  this 
being  in  his  view  any  disparagement  or 
disappointment,  the  only  effect  it  has  on 
his  mind  is  to  give  assurance  that  the 
excellency  of  the  power  must  be  of  God. 

It  is  a  mere  commonplace  now  that  this 
excellency  of  power  has  been  found,  is  always 
to  be  found,  in  these  sacred  Scriptures.  It 
is  now  more  than  two  millenniums  since  that 
Psalm  was  written  in  which  the  sacred 
oracles  of  the  Hebrews,  then  scanty  and 
incomplete,  were  represented  as  "  converting 
the  soul,"  "  making  wise  the  simple,"  "  re- 
joicing the  heart,"  **  enlightening  the  eyes." 
And  has  not  the  claim  been  abundantly 
justified  through  all  the  centuries  and  to 
the  ends  of  the  earth  ?  In  other  sacred 
books  and  in  the  writings  of  ancient  sages 
we  find  passages  that  would  not  be  disgraced 

M 


i62  POWER  OF  THE  WORD 

by  comparison  with  what  is  here — passages 
of  rarest  beauty,  of  loftiest  tone,  of  spiritual 
discernment  even  ;  but  everywhere  else  we 
miss  the  excellency  of  the  power. 

There  is  a'  dynamic  here  which  we  dis- 
cover nowhere  else,  and  that  dynamic  lies 
in  the  Gospel  of  God,  the  treasure  hid 
in  these  earthen  vessels.  The  Chinese 
preacher,  familiar  with  the  writings  of  Con- 
fucius and  the  faith  of  Buddha,  well  caught 
this  special  characteristic  of  the  Gospel. 
He  represented  a  sinner  lying  in  a  deep 
pit,  unable  to  extricate  himself  from  its 
mire.  Confucius  came  to  the  edge  of  the 
pit,  and  said,  "  Poor  fellow,  I  am  very  sorry 
for  you.  Why  were  you  such  a  fool  as  to 
get  in  there  ?  Let  me  give  you  a  piece  of 
advice ;  if  you  get  out,  don't  get  in  again." 
A  Buddhist  priest  next  came  by,  and  said, 
"  Poor  fellow !  I  am  very  much  pained  to 
see  you  there.  I  think  if  you  could  scramble 
up  two-thirds  of  the  way,  or  even  half,  I 
could  reach  you  and  lift  you  up  the  rest." 
But  the  man  in  the  pit  could  not  get  out 
of  the  mire.  Then  the  Saviour  came  by, 
and  took  him  from  the  horrible  pit  and 
from  the  miry  clay  and  set  his  feet  upon 
a  rock,  and  put  a  new  song  in  his  mouth. 


SPIRIT  AND   LIFE  163 

This  is  the  power  which  makes  the  Bible 
unique.  It  is  to  this  that  prophets,  apostles, 
and  Christ  Himself  make  special  appeal. 
Jeremiah  writes :  "  Is  not  My  word  like  as 
fire,  saith  the  Lord ;  and  like  a  hammer 
that  breaketh  the  rock  in  pieces  ?  "  So  the 
Apostle  Peter  speaks  of  "  The  word  of  God 
which  liveth  and  abideth  for  ever "  ;  and  in 
the  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews  we  read  :  "  The 
word  of  God  is  living  and  active,  and  sharper 
than  any  two-edged  sword,  and  piercing 
even  to  the  dividing  of  soul  and  spirit,  of 
both  joints  and  marrow,  and  quick  to  discern 
the  thoughts  and  intents  of  the  heart."  In 
the  same  way  our  Lord,  finding  fault  with* 
the  pedantic  literalism  of  the  Jews,  said : 
**  It  is  the  spirit  that  quickeneth  ;  the  flesh 
profiteth  nothing:  the  words  that  I  have 
spoken  unto  you  are  spirit  and  are  life." 

The  ethical  and  religious  productions  of 
those  who  made  their  researches  and  re- 
corded the  results  of  them  apart  from  the 
Scriptures — where  are  they  ?  Where,  for 
example,  are  the  moralists  and  philosophers 
of  Greece  and  Rome  ?  Their  works,  indeed, 
are  on  the  shelves  of  every  scholar  in  Chris- 
tendom ;  but  in  what  capacity  ?  As  autho- 
rities ?     Not  at  all ;  simply   as  monuments 


i64  POWER   OF  THE   WORD 

of  genius  and  chapters  of  intellectual 
history.  Who  would  ever  think,  when  con- 
sidering the  question,  **  Wherewithal  shall 
a  young  man  cleanse  his  way  ? "  of  answer- 
ing it  by  saying,  "  By  taking  heed  thereto 
according  to  Aristotle's  *  Nicomachian 
Ethics  ' !  "  Yet  Aristotle's  "  Nicomachian 
Ethics  "  is  perhaps  the  very  best  book  ever 
produced  on  the  subject  without  aid  from 
revelation.  Who  would  ever  think  of 
expecting  a  soul-satisfying  solution  to  the 
problem,  "If  a  man  die,  shall  he  live 
again  ?  "  in  the  "  Phsdo  "  of  Plato,  unrivalled 
as  it  is  among  the  literature  of  antiquity 
on  the  subject  of  the  soul's  immortality  ? 
Is  there  a  single  Greek  or  Roman  classic 
on  the  subject  of  man's  condition  and 
prospects  that  would  be  of  the  slightest 
use  to  a  soul  burdened  with  sin,  or  pressed 
with  the  weight  of  this  most  solemn  of 
all  questions :  "  How  shall  a  man  be  just 
with  God  ?  "  They  are  all  out  of  date — 
cold  monuments  of  genius,  dead  relics  of 
antiquity,  almost  forgotten  attempts  to 
sound  the  mysteries  of  life  and  death. 

Or  again,  where  is  the  sceptical  writer  of 
two  thousand  years  ago,  or  one  thousand,  or 
one  hundred,  or  fifty — one  is  almost  tempted 


PERENNIAL  VITALITY  165 

to  come  down  like  Abraham,  to  ten,  and 
to  ask.  Where  is  one  of  them  that  our 
sceptical  friends  will  stand  by,  as  we 
stand  by  Moses  and  David,  by  Matthew 
and  Paul  ?  They  are  all  out  of  date,  and 
their  works  are  to  be  found,  if  found 
at  all,  amidst  the  dusty,  moth-eaten  relics 
of  the  past,  in  the  British  Museum,  or 
on  the  antiquary's  book-shelf.  But  who 
will  venture  to  predict  the  time  when 
you  will  have  to  ransack  the  antiquary's 
library  to  find  a  copy  of  the  writings 
of  Moses,  David,  Solomon,  Isaiah,  Hosea, 
Matthew,  Paul,  or  John  ?  These  authors 
are  all  old,  but  they  are  always  new. 
Old  as  they  are,  their  words  are  as 
weighty,  as  powerful,  as  ever,  and  they  are 
far  more  widely  read  to-day  than  at  any 
previous  time.  In  some  old  Bible  of  your 
grandfather,  between  the  leaves  which 
enclose  some  cherished  passage  that  had 
often  cheered  the  old  man's  heart,  there  is, 
perhaps,  a  little  relic  of  the  past — a  rose 
leaf,  a  sprig  of  heliotrope,  a  forget-me-not. 
The  colour  is  gone,  the  scent  has  evaporated, 
even  the  grace  of  form  is  crushed  out  of 
all  recognition.  You  must  touch  it  very 
tenderly,    or  it  will  crumble  into   dust,  and 


1 66  POWER  OF  THE  WORD 

be  all  gone.  It  abides  after  a  fashion,  as 
human  things  abide;  it  does  not  live  and 
abide  as  divine  things  live  and  abide.  But 
the  promise,  over  against  which  the  little 
flower  is  lying,  not  only  abides,  but  lives. 
It  lives  in  ten  thousand  hearts  as  well  as 
in  yours,  as  rich  in  colour,  as  fresh  in 
fragrance,  as  delightful  to  the  soul  as  ever 
it  was.  "  All  flesh  is  grass,  and  all  the 
goodliness  thereof  is  as  the  flower  of  the 
field.  The  grass  withereth,  and  the  flower 
thereof  falleth  away ;  but  the  word  of  the 
Lord  endureth  for  ever."  The  word  of  God 
is  not  like  that  of  Demosthenes  or  of  Cicero, 
whose  speeches  may  still  move  to  admiration 
but  can  no  longer  lead  men  on  to  action  as 
in  the  days  when  they  were  fresh  and  strong. 
The  word  of  God  lives  and  breathes ;  lives 
with  the  life  and  breathes  with  the  breath 
of  the  Spirit  of  the  living  God.  This  is  the 
secret  of  its  perennial  freshness ;  this  is 
the  secret  of  its  immortal  youth  :  "  It  is  the 
Spirit  that  quickeneth."  Of  Homer,  and 
Virgil,  and  Dante,  and  Milton ;  of  Aris- 
totle and  Seneca,  and  Descartes  and  Bacon ; 
of  Demosthenes,  and  Cicero,  and  Burke — 
it  may  be  said  :  "  He  being  dead  yet 
speaketh";    but    of    the    Inspirer    of    the 


IN  ALL  LITERARY   FORMS  167 

Bible,  and  of  Him  alone,  it  can  be  said  : 
"  He,  being  alive,  yet  speaketh."  The 
Spirit  of  God  may  use,  often  does  use, 
other  books ;  but  He  identifies  Himself 
with  the  Bible.  He  makes  it  vocal  with 
His  loving  voice,  and  vital  with  His  living 
power. 

We  find  this  power  running  through  all 
the  different  forms  of  literature  which  have 
been  employed.  It  is  not  equally  distributed, 
but  it  so  pervades  the  Bible  as  a  whole  that 
it  is  no  exaggeration  to  say  that  **  All  Scripture 
is  given  by  inspiration  of  God,  and  is  profit- 
able for  doctrine,  for  reproof,  for  correction, 
for  instruction  in  riofhteousness  :  that  the  man 
of  God  may  be  perfect,  throughly  furnished 
unto  all  good  works."  There  maybe  a  ques- 
tion whether  there  is  any  of  the  excellence 
of  this  power  in  the  Book  of  Esther,  for 
example  ;  but  that  does  not  affect  the  general 
statement,  it  only  suggests  the  reasonableness 
of  the  doubt  which  has  all  along  been  enter- 
tained as  to  the  place  of  that  book  in  the 
canon. 

In  view  of  this  all-pervasiveness  of  the 
power,  we  can  see  how  the  whole  of  the 
Scriptures,  and  not  only  those  parts  where 
the  Gospel  is  specially  prominent,  may  be 


i68  POWER   OF   THE  WORD 

truly  inspired  of  God.  We  must  not  over- 
press  the  metaphor  of  the  earthen  vessels  and 
the  treasure  therein  contained,  as  indicating 
that  we  can  separate  the  one  from  the  other 
and  show  what  parts  of  the  Bible  are  earthen, 
and  what  pure  treasure.  We  may  illustrate 
the  intermingling  of  the  divine  and  the 
human  in  the  Scriptures  by  the  intermingling 
of  flesh  and  spirit  in  the  human  body.  This 
illustration  is  fully  justified  because,  as  we 
have  seen  in  the  introductory  chapter,  it  is 
covered  by  the  large  sense  of  the  word 
"  inspiration "  :  "  There  is  a  spirit  in  man, 
and  the  inspiration  of  the  Almighty  hath 
given  him  understanding."  But  who  can 
tell  the  place  of  the  spirit  ?  It  shines  out 
in  some  places  more  than  in  others — most  of 
all,  no  doubt,  in  the  eyes.  But  are  not  the 
eyes  flesh?  It  diminishes  as  we  go  down 
and  out  to  the  extremities,  almost  disappear- 
ing, as  we  may  say,  in  hair  and  finger-nails, 
which  are  not  even  sensitive  to  the  knife. 
But  the  life,  in  some  mysterious  manner, 
extends  even  there,  for  does  not  the  power  of 
growth  prove  its  presence  ?  So  in  Scripture 
there  are  parts  where  the  power  is  at  the 
minimum,  and  there  are  glowing  centres  where 
it  is  at  the  maximum ;  but  just  as  there  is  life 


INCIDENTAL  EXCELLENCY      169 

power  in  every  part  of  the  body,  so  there  is 
spirit  power  diffused  throughout  the  Bible. 

While  the  power  may  be  said  to  be  not 
only  excellent,  but  even  perfect  when  viewed 
in  relation  to  the  great  object  for  which 
the  revelation  was  given,  there  are  other 
marvellous  excellencies  of  the  Scriptures 
which  are  quite  incidental.  So  long  as  these 
are  looked  upon  as  merely  incidental,  they 
add  in  a  delightful  manner  to  the  evidence 
of  divine  inspiration.  Take,  as  an  example 
of  this,  the  utterances  which  trench  on  the 
domain  of  science.  Make  this  a  primary 
consideration,  make  it  an  essential  that  there 
should  be  in  all  such  places  an  accurate 
anticipation  of  scientific  discovery,  make  the 
whole  credibility  of  the  Bible  turn  on  this 
complete  correspondence,  and  you  raise  a 
host  of  difficulties  which  no  ingenuity  can 
completely  remove,  and  men  like  Tyndall 
and  Huxley  are  forced  into  scepticism.  But 
bear  in  mind  that  the  great  object  is  to 
reveal  God  and  make  known  His  salvation, 
and  that  therefore  we  ought  not  to  look  for 
anticipations  of  scientific  discovery ;  then, 
when  we  find  how  far  above  their  contem- 
poraries the  inspired  writers  were,  even  in 


170  POWER  OF  THE  WORD 

this  point  of  view ;  when  we  find  them  using 
language  which,  though  not  anticipating 
modern  discovery,  is  yet  by  its  elevation 
of  thought  not  unworthy  of  it,  we  see  how 
the  inspiration  which  runs  specially  along 
the  line  of  the  moral  and  spiritual  has, 
at  the  same  time,  an  enlarging  and  refining 
effect  on  the  action  of  the  mind  in  regard 
to  subjects  only  incidentally  touched.  In 
all  this  there  are  new  and  striking  tokens 
of  divine  inspiration.  As  illustration,  let  us 
glance  at  the  epic  of  Creation  in  the  begin- 
ning of  the  Bible.  What  a  contrast  to  other 
cosmogonies !  Read  it  as  an  astronomical 
and  geological  treatise,  and  you  have  endless 
difficulties ;  read  it  as  a  revelation  of  the  one 
God  in  nature,  and  you  have  not  only  the 
perfect  accomplishment  of  the  main  object, 
but  you  have  incidentally  a  most  marvellous 
correspondence  with  what  science  has  re- 
vealed— a  correspondence  so  marvellous  that 
some  distinguished  astronomers  and  geolo- 
gists have  actually  believed  it  to  be  a 
minutely  accurate  record.  Make  the  de- 
mand that  it  must  be  a  scientific  revelation, 
and  you  put  innumerable  weapons  into  the 
hand  of  the  enemy ;  take  it  as  it  obviously  is 
given,  and  you  not  only  get  rid  of  all  the 


INCIDENTAL   EXCELLENCY  171 

difficulties,  but  you  have  such  excellency — 
excellency  above  all  that  uninspired  men 
have  ever  accomplished  in  the  same  direc- 
tion— that  one  recognizes  even  here  the 
manifest  tokens  of  the  divine  Inspiration. 

To  take  another  illustration  of  the  same 
kind.  We  have  no  reason  to  believe  that 
when  the  great  Prophet  of  the  Captivity 
looked  up  to  the  starry  heavens,  he  was 
miraculously  endowed  with  the  knowledge 
of  the  Astronomer  Royal  of  the  twentieth 
century.  We  cannot  suppose  that  on  the 
basis  of  science  miraculously  made  known 
to  him  in  advance,  he  would  have  the  same 
impression  of  the  vastness  of  the  universe 
and  the  minuteness  of  man  as  we  have. 
How  comes  it,  then,  that  when  he  has 
occasion  to  touch  on  the  theme,  he  does 
it  in  a  way  that  scarcely  betrays  the  limi- 
tation of  his  knowledge,  he  does  it  in  a 
way  that  would  make  it  possible  to  read 
what  he  says  about  it  at  a  meeting  of  the 
British  Association,  and  no  one  would  feel 
that  it  fell  short  of  the  requirements  of  the 
theme  ?  Read  Isaiah  xl.  from  the  twelfth 
verse  to  the  end,  and  say  if  there  is  any 
utterance  of  modern  times,  I  say  not  to 
excel   it,  but  even   to  equal  it.      How  did 


172  POWER  OF  THE  WORD 

this  come  to  pass  ?  Because  he  was  in- 
spired so  as  to  see  the  great  results  of 
modern  astronomy  ?  Certainly  not ;  but 
because  he  had  a  vision  of  God,  and  God 
is  greater  than  all  His  worlds.  It  was  the 
inspiration  of  the  Almighty  that  so  enlarged 
his  mind  that  not  only  did  he  speak  truly 
of  God,  but  his  language  about  the  works 
of  God  was  such  that  it  has  not  staled  in 
twenty-five  centuries.  What  intelligent  man 
can  fail  to  see  the  excellency  of  the  power 
even  there  ? 

Illustrations  of  this  kind  might  be  multi- 
plied, bringing  out  other  incidental  excel- 
lencies :  the  wonderful  literary  charm  of  an 
idyll  like  Ruth,  for  example;  the  exquisite 
poetry  of  many  of  the  Psalms;  the  eagle 
flights  of  a  quondam  fisherman  like  John ; 
the  elevation,  not  only  of  thought  but  even 
of  language  in  a  book  like  the  Apocalypse, 
where  the  occasional  badness  of  the  Greek 
is  surely  sufficient  evidence  that  there  was 
no  miraculous  superseding  of  the  author's 
limitations ;  and  all  would  go  to  make  it 
clear  that  while,  on  the  supposition  that 
the  men  were  lifted  miraculously  out  of  their 
natural  limitations,  there  are  endless  diffi- 
culties,   it   is   only   necessary   to   remember 


INCIDENTAL  EXCELLENCY     173 

that  they  were  all  "  earthen  vessels,"  in 
order  not  only  to  surmount  all  the  diffi- 
culties, but  to  see  in  the  unquestionable 
excellence  of  thought  and  style  and  even 
of  language,  new  tokens  of  the  inspiration 
of  the  Almighty. 


CHAPTER  XIII 
The  Place  of  Criticism 

HAS  criticism  any  place  in  dealing  with 
the  sacred  Scriptures  ?  And  if  so, 
what  ? 

We  must  settle  first  what  we  mean  by 
criticism.  It  is  perhaps  due  to  the  depravity 
of  human  nature  that  the  word  almost  in- 
variably suggests  fault-finding.  When  a 
book  is  handed  over  to  a  critic,  must  he 
find  fault  with  it  ?  The  fault-finding  function 
is  needed,  if  there  are  serious  faults  to  find. 
But  what  if  the  book  be  superlatively  good  ? 
Then  his  function  is  to  recognize  and  call 
attention  to  its  excellencies.  And  if  it  be 
only  fairly  good,  he  will  have  both  functions 
to  discharge. 

There  are  then  two  kinds  of  criticism,  that 

of  appreciation,  and  that  of  depreciation.    In 

proportion  as  the  work  is  good  and  the  critic 

competent,  will  his  criticism  be  appreciative. 

174 


THE  CRITICS  MAGNA    CHART  A  175 

And  surely  it  would  be  a  great  mistake 
to  refuse  him  the  opportunity.  If  he  has 
the  power  of  discovering  merits  which  are 
apt  to  be  hid  from  the  average  reader,  why 
should  he  not  be  allowed  to  point  these 
out? 

This  is  clearly  the  Apostle  Paul's  idea,  as 
shown  in  the  striking  passage  i  Corinthians 
ii.  1 1- 1 5,  where  he  calls  for  this  critical  appre- 
ciation. He  expects  and  wishes  the  criticism 
to  be  thorough  and  searching.  The  word 
he  uses  is  avaKpivoi^  which  is  just  our  word 
"criticize,"  with  a  strengthening  prefix 
specially  calling  for  earnest,  careful  scrutiny. 
Only  he  insists  that  the  critic  must  be  com- 
petent. As  the  things  he  is  dealing  with 
are  spiritual  things,  he  must  have  the 
spiritual  faculty :  **  The  natural  man,"  he 
says,  *'  receiveth  not  the  things  of  the  Spirit 
of  God  :  for  they  are  foolishness  unto  him : 
neither  can  he  know  them,  because  they  are 
spiritually  discerned.  But  (and  here  is  the 
critic's  Magna  Charta)  he  that  is  spiritual 
judgeth  all  things,  yet  he  himself  is  judged 
of  no  man"  (vers.  14,  15).  That  is  liberty, 
is  it  not  ?  Why  is  the  Apostle  not  afraid 
to  give  the  critic  so  loose  a  rein  ?  Because 
the  man  who  is   truly   spiritual    is  sure  to 


176  THE  PLACE  OF  CRITICISM 

appreciate,    not    depreciate,   the    things    of 
God. 

So  far,  the  question  seems  exceedingly- 
simple.  But  a  complication  comes  in,  so 
far  as  the  Scriptures  are  concerned,  when 
we  remember  that  there  are  two  elements 
to  be  considered  :  the  revelation  which  is 
of  God,  and  the  record  of  it  which  is  through 
the  agency  of  man,  used  by  God,  indeed, 
in  His  adorable  providence,  but  not  so  as 
to  obliterate  the  human  personality.  This 
view  of  the  subject  is  put  strikingly  before 
us  by  the  same  Apostle  in  the  passage  we 
have  used  in  another  connection,  "  We  have 
this  treasure  ("  the  light  of  the  knowledge 
of  the  glory  of  God "  referred  to  in  the 
preceding  verse)  in  earthen  vessels,  that  the 
excellency  of  the  power  may  be  of  God  and 
not  of  us."  There  are  two  things  therefore 
to  be  considered  :  first  the  treasure  of  divine 
revelation,  and  next  the  earthen  vessels 
which  contain  it.  Let  us  examine  what  is 
the  place,  and  what  ought  to  be  the  attitude 
of  criticism  in  the  one  case  and  in  the  other. 

'  (i)  In  regard  to  the  divine  revelation,  there 
surely  can  be  no  place  for  the  fault-finding 
critic.     Shall   any  one  find  fault  with  "the 


AS   REGARDS   THE  TREASURE  177 

light  of  the  knowledge  of  the  glory  of  God  "  ? 
Nor  can  there  be  any  place  for  the  superior 
critic.  Some  might  be  disposed  to  think  the 
Apostle  wrong  in  giving  criticism,  even  the 
most  appreciative  criticism,  any  place  here. 
Is  it  not  presumption  to  express  any  opinion, 
however  laudatory  ?  It  would  certainly  be, 
if  it  were  done  with  a  sense  of  superiority. 
Here,  again,  it  is  apt  to  be  assumed  that 
a  critic  is  necessarily  a  superior  person — 
another  token  of  the  depravity  of  human 
nature,  for  surely  it  is  not  a  fair  assumption. 
Shakespeare  has  had  many  critics.  Do  they 
all  assume  superiority?  Does  any  one  of 
them,  worth  listening  to,  assume  superiority  ? 
And  if  the  ordinary  critic  of  Shakespeare 
naturally  takes  a  place  far  beneath  the  works 
he  is  appreciating,  how  much  more  shall  we 
expect  that  he  whose  duty  it  is  to  call 
attention  to  the  things  of  God  will  not  only 
not  assume  superiority — surely  an  unthink- 
able audacity ! — but  will  bow  low  in  adora- 
tion at  His  feet. 

When  we  consider  this,  we  shall  see  how 
completely  out  of  court  are  a  whole  class  of 
self-styled  critics.  They  take  up  the  sacred 
Scriptures,  and  subject  them  to  a  scrutiny 
which  may   be   careful   enough,    but   which 

N 


178  THE   PLACE   OF  CRITICISM 

deliberately  sets  aside  things  of  God  as 
an  impossibility.  They  start  with  the  dogma 
of  the  denial  of  the  supernatural.  What 
possible  chance  is  there  of  appreciation 
there  ?  The  things  of  God  are  necessarily 
"  foolishness "  to  such  people,  neither  can 
they  know  them  ;  because  the  things  of 
God  are  spiritually  discerned,  and  they  are 
at  the  opposite  pole. 

Such  persons  are  absolutely  incompetent 
critics,  no  matter  how  learned  and  even  wise 
they  may  be  in  the  things  of  the  world. 
This  seems  self-evident,  but  it  is  far  too 
little  realized  in  Bible  criticism.  There  are 
many  who  seem  to  think  that  if  a  man  is  a 
great  linguist,  an  accomplished  historian, 
and  an  acute  literary  critic,  he  is  just  the 
man  to  deal  thoroughly  and  satisfactorily 
with  divine  revelation ;  and  yet  he  may 
be  absolutely  incompetent.  This  is  what 
the  Apostle  so  strongly  urges  in  his  letter 
to  the  Corinthians.  Corinth  was  not  far 
from  Athens  geographically,  and  it  was  not 
very  far  behind  it  in  culture.  There  were 
many  competent  critics  there  of  the  literary, 
the  historical,  the  linguistic,  and  the  artistic. 
And  these  faculties  all  had  their  value  in 
literature,   in   history,    in  language,  in  art ; 


AS   REGARDS   THE  TREASURE         179 

but  the  possession  of  any  or  all  of  these  did 
not  constitute  a  man  a  qualified  critic  of 
divine  revelation. 

Can  any  one  really  dispute  the  justice  of 
the  Apostle's  position  ?  Who  would  think 
of  submitting  a  scheme  of  colour  to  the  most 
learned  and  accomplished  man  in  all  the 
world,  if  he  were  blind  ?  Who  would  submit 
a  Sonata  of  Beethoven  to  a  deaf  man,  or 
even  to  the  greatest  scholar  in  the  land,  if 
he  had  no  ear  for  music  ?  The  fatal  objec- 
tion in  every  such  case  would  be  that  he  was 
destitute  of  the  only  faculty  to  which  the 
final  appeal  can  rightly  be  made. 

Suppose  the  passage  we  are  reading  to 
be  the  healing  of  the  paralytic,  and  that  we 
have  come  to  the  place  where  Jesus,  answer- 
ing His  critics,  says,  **  That  ye  may  know 
that  the  Son  of  Man  hath  power  on  earth 
to  forgive  sins,  (then  saith  He  to  the  sick  of 
the  palsy,)  Arise,  take  up  thy  bed,  and  go 
unto  thy  house."  We  see  the  light  in  Jesus' 
face,  recognize  the  grandeur  of  His  mission, 
and  the  appropriateness  alike  of  the  deed 
of  mercy  and  the  word  of  grace.  It  is  the 
opening  of  heaven  and  the  pouring  of  light 
on  earth's  darkness.  Our  hearts  are  full 
of  thanksgiving  and  praise.     But  here  are 


i8o  THE   PLACE  OF   CRITICISM 

two  men  approaching  from  opposite  direc- 
tions. One  of  them  says,  "  Suppose  I  could 
change  the  pen  with  which  I  write  this  into 
a  pen-wiper,  I  should  not  thus  make  what 
I  write  any  the  truer  or  more  convincing." 
The  other  makes  a  similar  remark  about  a 
centaur  trotting  down  Regent  Street.  Surely 
these  men  must  have  been  very  vulgar 
people !  No ;  on  the  contrary,  one  is  an 
apostle  of  sweetness  and  light,  and  the  other 
is  a  master  of  scientific  exposition  ;  the  name 
of  the  one  being  Matthew  Arnold,  and  of 
the  other  Thomas  H.  Huxley.  But  are  such 
men  as  these  at  all  capable  of  judging  our 
Lord's  deeds  of  mercy  .-*  On  the  other 
hand,  to  the  humblest  man,  who  has  had 
the  experience  of  sins  forgiven  and  of  grace 
to  walk  in  the  paths  of  righteousness  after 
powers  atrophied  by  neglect  or  palsied  by 
sin,  the  deed  of  Christ  is  no  breach  of 
nature's  laws,  rather  a  healing  of  some  old 
breach,  the  most  natural  thing  in  all  the 
world  to  be  done  by  the  Saviour  of  the 
world,  the  great  Healer,  "  der  Heiland,"  as 
the  Germans  beautifully  call  Him.  "  In  Thy 
light  shall  we  see  light " ;  in  the  light  of  the 
knowledge  of  the  glory  of  God  (and  salvation 
is  His  glory)  we  see  wondrous  light  in  the 


AS   REGARDS  THE  TREASURE  i8i 

story  on  the  printed  page.  Think  of  the 
imbecility,  to  say  nothing  of  the  unspirituality, 
of  putting  the  change  of  a  pen  into  a  pen- 
wiper, or  the  trotting  of  a  centaur  down 
Regent  Street,  in  the  same  category  as  that 
great  and  blessed  revelation  of  the  fulfilment 
of  man's  greatest  need ! 

Let  it  be  set  down  then  as  absolutely 
necessary  to  competence  for  the  position 
of  Bible  critic,  that  a  man  have  the  spiritual 
faculty,  that  he  not  only  does  not  deny  God, 
but  that  he  has  an  eye  to  see  the  light  of 
His  glory,  an  ear  attuned  to  hear  His  voice, 
his  whole  nature  open  to  welcome  His  Holy 
Spirit. 

On  the  other  hand,  such  a  man  is 
competent  to  recognize  the  things  of  God 
even  though  he  be  destitute  of  all  other 
capabilities.  He  would  be  better  with  them, 
no  doubt,  but  he  can  do  without  them.  "  He 
that  is  spiritual  judgeth  all  things."  He 
cannot  help  it,  in  fact.  All  spiritual  men 
not  only  may  but  must  use  the  critical  faculty 
if  they  are  to  make  anything  of  their  Bibles. 
The  devout  reader  of  Holy  Scripture  is  using 
the  critical  faculty  continually.  Even  those 
who  hold,  or  think  they  hold  (for  it  is  only 
theory  with  them),  that  every  sentence  in 


i82  THE  PLACE  OF  CRITICISM 

all  the  Bible  is  equally  inspired  of  God, 
never  have  the  courage  of  their  opinions 
right  through.  They  open  their  Bible  about 
the  middle,  and  find  this  strong  and  very 
definite  declaration :  "  A  man  hath  no  pre- 
eminence over  a  beast"  (Ecclesiastes  iii.  19). 
They  turn  to  a  more  famihar  place  and  read  : 
"  Fear  not ;  ye  are  of  more  value  than  many 
sparrows."  Are  they  troubled  ?  Not  at  all. 
How  do  they  settle  it  ?  By  the  exercise 
of  higher  criticism.  It  is  not  lower  criticism. 
It  has  not  to  do  with  the  lexicon  or  the 
grammar.  They  are  not  equipped  for  that. 
But  they  have  the  higher  critical  faculty,  and 
they  use  it  without  hesitation.  There  is  not 
a  word  in  either  Ecclesiastes  or  Luke  to 
indicate  that  in  the  one  case  they  are  not 
to  believe  all  they  read,  and  in  the  other 
they  are.  There  is  no  preface  in  either  case 
to  indicate  that  the  literary  form  of  the  one 
book  is  quite  different  from  that  of  the  other. 
And  probably  our  simple  Bible  reader  could 
not  tell  why  it  is  he  treats  the  two  passages 
in  the  same  Bible  so  very  differently.  He 
is  probably  not  consciously  exercising  the 
faculty  of  higher  criticism,  but  he  is  most 
certainly  doing  it,  however  unconsciously. 
"  He  that  is  spiritual  judgeth  all  things." 


AS  REGARDS   THE  TREASURE         183 

How  is  it  that  the  Bible  of  the  simplest 
saints  will  be  well  worn  and  thumbed, 
perhaps  actually  torn,  at  the  Psalms  and  in 
Gospels,  and  the  page  quite  clean  in  Leviticus 
and  in  Esther  ?  It  is  because  they  are  higher 
critics.  And  their  criticism  is  perfectly  just. 
They  might  not  acknowledge  in  words  that 
there  are  degrees  of  inspiration  in  the  Bible  ; 
but  the  markings  in  their  Bibles  make  it  per- 
fectly plain  that  in  effect  they  do.  It  is  quite 
possible,  indeed,  for  one  who  has  nothing 
of  the  critical  faculty  to  read  over  the  whole 
Bible  mechanically,  a  chapter  a  day  perhaps, 
and  get  as  much  good  out  of  the  toughest 
morsels  as  out  of  the  sweetest,  that  is,  pro- 
bably, no  good  at  all.  Such  an  one  can 
dispense  altogether  with  criticism  of  all 
kinds ;  but  if  he  is  to  make  real  use  of  his 
Bible,  if  he  is  to  discern  the  things  of  God 
which  are  there,  he  must  read  it  in  the  light 
of  such  critical  faculty  as  he  has.  "He  that 
is  spiritual  judgeth  all  things." 

"  Yet  he  himself  is  judged  of  no  man."  A 
whole  university  of  learned  professors  giving 
their  verdict  on  matters  linguistic,  historical, 
literary,  philosophical,  metaphysical,  might 
rule  out  the  supernatural.  It  would  not 
affect  him  in  the  least.     He  has  an  ear  to 


i84  THE   PLACE   OF  CRITICISM 

hear  what  the  Spirit  saith.  He  hears  the 
music  of  the  spheres.  "  The  rest  may  reason 
and  welcome  ;  'tis  we  musicians  know."  Or, 
to  put  it  in  apostoHc  phrase  :  **  He  has  an 
unction  from  the  Holy  One,  and  knows." 

(2)  But  is  not  the  treasure  in  earthen 
vessels  ?  And  is  there  not  room  here  for 
a  different  kind  of  criticism  ?  And  may 
not  the  qualities  which  were  inadequate  for 
appreciating  the  things  of  God  be  sufficient 
for  dealing  with  the  earthen  vessels  ? 

There  is  some  truth  in  this  way  of  putting 
it.  The  revelation  of  God  comes  to  us  in 
the  ordinary  vehicles  of  speech  and  story, 
poetry  and  prose,  biography,  history,  and 
literature  generally.  In  order,  therefore,  to 
deal  with  this  side  of  the  things  of  God,  it 
is  necessary  that  there  should  be  a  critical 
apparatus  ;  hence  scholarship  of  all  kinds, — 
linguistic,  historical,  literary, — is  useful,  and 
for  thorouo^h  work  needful.  We  have  seen 
that  the  man  who^  is  spiritual  is  in  the  main 
thing  independent  of  all  these :  he  can  find 
the  things  of  God,  however  little  he  knows 
of  these  other  things  ;  and  he  can  hold  to  the 
things  of  God,  however  much  learned  critics 
in  the  lower  sphere  may  say  against  them. 


AS   REGARDS   THE  VESSELS  185 

But  if  he  is  a  wise  and  humble  man,  he  will 
keep  to  his  own  sphere.  He  will  not  feel 
called  upon  stoutly  to  deny  what  some  gram- 
marian has  to  say  about  grammar,  or  some 
linguist  about  language,  or  some  literary 
man  about  style,  or  some  historic  critic  about 
particular  events.  If  what  is  said  on  these 
things  trouble  him  at  all,  it  will  be  enough 
for  him  to  think  :  *'  Whether  these  things  be 
so  or  not,  I  know  not ;  one  thing  I  know,  that 
whereas  I  was  blind,  now  I  see."  The  reve- 
lation of  God  lies  clear  before  him,  for  he 
has  the  spiritual  eye  ;  the  divine  voice  is  dis- 
tinctly heard,  for  he  has  the  spiritual  ear ;  the 
treasure  in  the  vessel  is  grandly  appreciated, 
for  he  has  the  spiritual  mind  ;  but  he  is  not  the 
man  to  settle  dogmatically  difficult  questions 
which  belong  to  another  sphere,  such  as  the 
nature  and  degrees  of  inspiration.  The  fact 
of  inspiration  he  sees  and  knows  ;  he  cannot 
help  seeing  it,  for  the  light  of  the  knowledge 
of  the  glory  of  God  is  shining  in  his  heart  ; 
but  the  nature  and  degree  of  it  he  is 
not  capable  of  discussing.  Such  a  difficult 
(though  comparatively  unimportant  question) 
requires  other  faculties  than  his. 

Still,  on  the  other  hand,  it  is  important  to 
remember  that  while  scholarship  is  necessary 


i86  THE  PLACE  OF   CRITICISM 

in  order  to  competence  for  dealing  with 
the  earthen-vessel  side  of  things,  even  here 
the  spiritual  mind  is  indispensable  for  com- 
plete competence.  We  do  not  say  that  the 
work  of  unspiritual  men  is  never  of  any  use. 
It  may  be,  especially  in  the  way  of  gathering 
materials ;  but  for  any  thorough  dealing 
even  with  the  human  side  of  revelation,  it 
is  quite  necessary  that  there  should  be  the 
spiritual  faculty. 

The  reason  of  this  lies  in  the  fact  that 
the  divine  and  human  in  revelation  are  not 
practically  separable.  Here  is  where  the 
Apostle's  admirable  illustration  falls  short 
of  the  whole  truth,  as  all  illustrations  must. 
If  we  could  hand  over  the  treasure  to  the 
spiritual  man,  and  the  earthen  vessel  to  the 
intellectual  and  scholarly  man,  and  let  each 
deal  with  his  own  and  leave  the  other 
untouched,  it  might  work.  But  you  cannot 
do  this.  The  inspiration  of  the  Scriptures 
is  like  the  inspiration  of  the  man.  It  is  all 
through.  God  breathed  into  man's  nostrils 
the  breath  of  life.  The  in-breathed  life  is 
all  through  the  body — in  greater  degree  in 
some  parts,  in  lesser  degree  in  others — 
but  it  pervades  the  whole,  so  that  you 
cannot  take  a  man,  and  hand  the  spiritual 


AS  REGARDS  THE  VESSELS  187 

part  of  him  apart  from  the  material,  to  one 
investigator,  and  the  bodily  part  of  him  with- 
out the  spirit  to  another.  Hence  it  comes 
that  even  in  the  investigation  of  the  body  the 
spirit  must  not  be  left  out  of  view,  just  as 
in  the  study  of  the  spirit  in  any  thorough 
way  the  body  also  must  be  taken  into 
account.  Let  it  be  understood  then  that 
while  the  divine  and  the  human  in  the 
Scriptures  are  separable  in  thought,  they 
are  not  so  in  fact.  Therefore  it  is  impos- 
sible to  judge  rightly  even  of  the  earthen 
vessel  if  we  have  no  appreciation  of  the 
treasure  which  is  in  it. 

This  will  appear  still  more  clearly  if  we 
remember  that  we  cannot  appreciate  the 
earthen  vessel  apart  from  its  relation  to  the 
treasure.  Here  is  where  many  excellent 
Christians  make  a  great  mistake.  They 
start  with  the  idea  that  God  cannot  use 
anything  earthen  at  all,  unless  He  miracu- 
lously takes  away  its  earthenness,  and  makes 
it  pure  heavenly.  And  whenever  the  pro- 
cess of  searching  discloses  the  earthenness 
of  any  of  the  vessels,  they  think  all  is  lost. 
Or  if  they  do  not  go  this  length,  they  think 
it  is  a  depreciation  of  the  Bible  to  point  it 
out.    Anything  earthen  in  the  Bible !    Perish 


i88  THE  PLACE    OF   CRITICISM 

the  thought !  But  if  they  look  at  the  matter 
with  the  Apostle's  eye,  they  will  see  that  the 
criticism  which  discloses  the  earthen  vessel 
is  really  appreciation,  not  of  the  vessel  but 
of  Him  who  can  use  it,  earthen  as  it  is 
and  must  be,  for  conveying  His  heavenly 
treasure.  Clearly  that  is  the  way  the  Apostle 
views  it :  *'  We  have  this  treasure  in  earthen 
vessels,  that  the  excellency  of  the  power 
may  be  of  God,  and  not  of  us." 

Even  in  this  case,  therefore,  mere  fault- 
finding and  error-picking  is  quite  incom- 
petent criticism.  Fault-finding  is  the  easiest 
thing  in  the  world.  Any  dullard  can  excel 
in  it.  But  appreciation,  specially  spiritual 
appreciation,  and  most  of  all,  perhaps,  the 
appreciation  of  the  divine  in  the  human, 
requires  the  spiritual  faculty.  A  man  who 
can  only  chip  away  at  the  earthen  vessel 
and  has  no  eye  for  the  treasure  in  it,  is 
quite  useless.  The  spiritual  man  can  judge 
the  spiritual  side  of  things  even  if  he  have  no 
faculty  for  scrutinizing  the  earthen  vessel  ; 
but  the  unspiritual  man  cannot  even  appraise 
the  earthen  vessel,  for  it  can  be  rightly 
appraised  only  in  relation  to  that  which  it 
contains  and  conveys.  A  man  might  judge 
a  picture  even  if  he  could  not  see  its  frame  ; 


AS  REGARDS  THE  VESSELS  189 

but  how  can  any  man  judge  the  frame  of  the 
picture  if  he  cannot  see  the  picture  ?  For  it 
is  not  only  that  spiritual  things  are  foolish- 
ness to  him,  but  even  the  natural  things  are 
often  foolish  to  him  if  he  cannot  see  the 
spiritual  shining  in  them  and  through  them. 

Take  a  very  homely  example.  Suppose  a 
being  scientifically  and  philosophically  gifted 
in  the  highest  degree,  but  completely  igno- 
rant of  love,  as  much  a  stranger  to  it  as  many 
a  man  is  to  God,  setting  himself  to  study 
the  actions  of  a  mother  fondling  her  infant, 
with  a  view  to  a  thorough  interpretation 
of  them  all.  He  follows  all  the  motions, 
describes  the  curves,  counts  the  number  of 
the  kisses  (all  the  time  wondering  what 
they  can  possibly  mean),  listens  to  the 
varied  sounds,  registers  and  tabulates  them 
all,  makes  the  most  careful  and  critical 
examination  of  every  phenomenon  —  and 
then  gives  out  as  his  sage  verdict,  **  The 
woman  is  a  fool."  For  are  not  all  these 
things  foolishness  to  him  ?  But  if  now 
there  could  come  suddenly  into  his  soul  a 
great  influx  of  love,  the  love  which  fills 
the  heart  of  the  father  of  the  child  as  he 
watches  the  same  process,  would  they 
be    foolishness   any   longer  ?      You   cannot 


iQO  THE  PLACE  OF  CRITICISM 

understand  even  the  outward  and  fleshly 
if  you  have  no  idea  of  the  inward  and 
spiritual. 

With  the  love  of  God  in  the  heart,  a  man 
will  see  it  all.  The  light  of  the  knowledge 
of  the  glory  of  God  will  shine  in  the  face  of 
Jesus  Christ,  and  rays  of  divine  light  and 
love  will  flash  out  from  every  page  of  the 
sacred  Scriptures. 


CHAPTER   XIV 
The  Gains  from  Reverent  Criticism 

ARE  we  to  have  no  chapter  on  the  losses  ? 
Certainly  not.  There  are  no  losses 
from  reverent  criticism.  We  admit  that  if 
irreverent  criticism  is  allowed  to  hold  the 
field,  nothing  but  loss  will  be  the  result. 
If  those  to  whom  the  word  of  revelation 
is  "  spirit  and  life  "  leave  the  searching  of 
the  Scriptures  to  those  destitute  of  the 
spiritual  faculty,  the  result  will  be  disastrous. 
It  will  be  like  a  report  of  human  life  reached 
through  the  anatomy  of  the  dead  body. 
The  criticism  of  depreciation  must  be  met 
by  the  criticism  of  appreciation ;  and  when 
Christian  people  put  the  most  appreciative 
critics  in  the  same  class  with  the  most 
destructive,  and  condemn  them  all  alike, 
they  certainly  do  their  best  to  play  into 
the  hands  of  the  foes  of  inspiration. 

We    admit    that     there    are    results    of 
191 


192     GAINS   FROM   REVERENT   CRITICISM 

investigation  which  look  Hke  loss.  If  a  man 
starts  with  a  rigid  theory  of  his  own  as  the 
foundation  of  his  faith,  it  is  no  wonder  that 
he  is  appalled  when  his  theory  is  set  aside. 
It  seems  a  terrible  loss.  But  what  if  he 
get  a  far  better  foundation  in  its  place  ? 
Will  not  the  disturbance  be  a  blessing  in 
disguise  ?  Among  the  great  and  precious 
promises  of  the  word  of  God  is  this  :  "God 
hath  promised  to  shake  not  the  earth  only, 
but  also  heaven "  (Hebrews  xii.  26),  and 
the  reason  why  this  is  a  promise  and  not 
a  threat  is  given  thus  :  *'  That  those  things 
which  cannot  be  shaken  may  remain."  That 
great  promise  God  has  often  fulfilled,  and 
He  has  been  fulfilling  it  in  our  times. 
Therefore,  whatever  apparent  losses  are 
the  result  of  spiritual  and  spirit-guided 
criticism  will  be  found  to  be  really  gains. 
Whatever  does  not  stand  in  times  like  these 
is  better  gone. 

We  have  no  word  of  scorn  or  even  of 
disparagement  for  the  temple  of  faith  as  it 
stood  in  the  days  of  our  fathers  and  grand- 
fathers. Its  foundation  was  in  the  holy 
mountains,  and  its  main  structure  was  of  the 
order  of  ''gold,  silver,  and  precious  stones," 
which  remain  and  ever  shall  abide.     There 


CONSTRUCTIVE  WORK  193 

was  indeed,  as  alas  !  there  always  is  in  all  that 
is  "of  this  building,"  some  "wood  and  hay 
and  stubble  "  ;  but  with  all  that  was  imper- 
fect in  it,  it  was  a  sanctuary  of  noble  souls, 
the  anthems  sung  in  it  did  not  roll  to  wintry 
skies,  and  the  worshippers  and  workers  who 
were  trained  in  it  did  great  things  for  the 
kingdom  of  God,  and  have  made  us  heirs 
of  institutions  and  enterprises  on  which  God 
has  poured  blessings  so  abundant  that  now 
the  whole  round  world  is  open  to  the  glad 
tidings  of  His  Gospel.  The  fires  which 
have  been  taking  away  the  wood  and  hay 
and  stubble  may  have  seemed  at  times  to 
threaten  the  structure  itself,  but  God  is 
mindful  of  His  own  ;  He  can  make,  and  has 
made,  the  wrath  of  the  destroyer  to  praise 
Him,  and  restrained  the  remainder  thereof. 
And  now  that  the  destroyer  has  done  his 
worst,  now  that  shakable  things  have  been 
shaken,  the  work  of  reconstruction  is  going 
on  apace,  and  we  have  good  reason  to 
believe  that  the  temple  of  faith  in  the 
twentieth  century  will  be  nobler  and  grander 
than  ever,  will  have  in  it  a  still  richer 
and  fuller  anthem  of  praise,  will  be  the 
nursing  mother  of  equally  devoted  sons  and 
daughters,  who  will  accomplish  even   more 

o 


194    GAINS   FROM   REVERENT  CRITICISM 

for  the  in-bringing  of  the  kingdom  of 
God  than  did  the  great  souls  who  lived  the 
life  and  did  the  work  of  the  century  that  is 
gone. 

Let  us,  then,  address  ourselves  hopefully 
to  the  subject  now  before  us  :  The  gains 
from  reverent  criticism.  We  shall  mention 
only  some  of  the  most  outstanding. 

I.  An  Unassailable  Foundation. 

It  is  very  difficult  for  those  believers  in 
verbal  inspiration,  whose  faith  is,  as  a  matter 
of  fact,  firmly  founded  on  the  Rock  Christ, 
and  who  therefore  can  say  with  the  Apostle, 
"  I  know  whom  I  have  believed,"  to  realize 
how  very  weak  is  the  theory  of  Scripture  on 
which  they  have  erroneously  supposed  their 
faith  to  rest.  Here  is  a  line  of  thought 
which  has  been  only  too  familiar  in  the  past : 
Why  do  you  believe  in  Christ  ?  Because  I 
read  about  Him  in  the  Bible. — Why  do  you 
believe  the  Bible?  Because  it  is  an  inspired 
book. — What  is  an  inspired  book  ?  A  book 
which  is  all  the  same  as  if  it  had  been  written 
by  the  finger  of  God,  so  that  every  line  and 
word  of  it  must  be  taken  as  if  it  came 
straight  out  of  heaven.  Now,  these  people's 
faith   may  be  of  the  strongest  and  noblest 


AN  UNASSAILABLE   FOUNDATION      195 

quality.  It  may  be  as  genuine  faith  in 
Christ  as  that  of  the  very  best  of  those  who 
hold  the  other  views.  The  mistake  is  in 
the  underpinning  of  it.  They  rest  Christ 
on  the  Bible  ;  and  so  far  there  is  no  practical 
harm  done,  for  the  Bible,  treated  fairly,  is 
quite  strong  enough  to  bear  the  weight ;  but 
then  they  rest  the  Bible  on  a  theory  of  in- 
spiration which  will  not  bear  any  weight. 
It  would  not  bear  the  weight  of  a  single 
believer,  as  is  often  found  to  be  tragically 
true.  Here  is  a  man  who  has  been  brought 
up  with  the  most  definite  views  of  the 
mechanical  theory  of  inspiration,  and  who 
on  that  basis  has  attended  Church  and 
taught  in  the  Sunday  School  for  many  years. 
He  is  suddenly  confronted  with  an  array 
of  Bible  difficulties  to  which  he  cannot  find 
any  satisfactory  answer.  If  only  now  his 
faith  rested  on  Christ  Himself,  these  difficul- 
ties, though  they  might  disturb  him,  would 
not  shake  him  in  the  least ;  but  resting  as  he 
does  on  a  theory  of  inspiration  and  finding 
that  it  does  not  stand  the  test,  he  thinks  he 
must  give  up  everything.  Because  there  are 
some  things  in  the  Bible  he  cannot  be  quite 
sure  of,  he  gives  it  all  up.  And  his  faith  in 
Christ  having  been  wholly  dependent  upon 


196    GAINS  FROM   REVERENT   CRITICISM 

the  belief  of  a  discredited  theory,  he  feels  him- 
self constrained  to  give  up  Christ  also,  and 
becomes  a  theist,  or  an  agnostic,  or  an  atheist. 
It  may  seem  to  many  good  people  of 
very  little  consequence  whether  a  man  says 
he  believes  in  Christ  because  He  is  in  the 
Bible,  or  believes  in  the  Bible  because  Christ 
is  in  it ;  but  there  is  all  the  difference  in 
the  world  between  the  stability  of  the  one 
position  and  of  the  other.  Christ,  as  set 
before  us  not  only  in  the  Gospel  pages,  and 
in  the  testimony  of  His  witnesses  throughout 
the  Scriptures,  but  in  His  personal  presence 
here  and  now,  is  a  fact  which  can  as  little 
be  set  aside  by  those  who  have  eyes  to  see 
as  can  the  sun  in  the  heaven.3.  The  theory 
of  verbal  inspiration  makes  no  such  appeal. 
You  cannot  say  that  a  man  is  spiritually 
blind  who  has  difficulty  as  to  the  high  praise- 
worthiness  of  Jael,  the  wife  of  Heber  the 
Kenite.  He  may  be  wrong,  of  course ;  but 
you  cannot  say  that  he  is  not  of  the  truth  if 
he  hesitate  as  to  whether  that  is  of  the  truth. 
The  light  of  the  knowledge  of  the  glory  of 
God  is  not  in  the  face  of  Jael,  as  it  is  in  the 
face  of  Jesus  Christ.  I  do  not  say  there  is 
absolutely  none  of  it  in  her  face,  but  it  does 
not   shine   out   there   so   as   to  condemn   a 


AN   UNASSAILABLE   FOUNDATION      197 

man  to  be  of  a   reprobate  mind  who  does 
not  discern  it. 

One  of  the  most  illuminating  and  con- 
vincing books  of  our  time  is  Carnegie 
Simpson's  "  Fact  of  Christ."  Every  link 
in  that  masterly  argument  is  entirely  in- 
dependent of  any  theory  of  inspiration,  or 
even  of  the  fact  of  inspiration.  It  would 
stand  good  if  we  knew  nothing  whatever 
about  the  origin  or  composition  of  any  of 
the  books  of  the  Bible.  It  simply  takes 
them  as  we  find  them,  just  as  we  might 
pick  up  a  collection  of  Greek  literature  and 
read  it  in  an  appreciative  spirit.  It  is  a 
fine  example  of  the  spirit  of  the  appreciative 
critic,  with  the  result  that  to  those  in 
sympathy  with  whatsoever  things  are  true, 
honest,  just,  pure,  lovely,  and  of  good  report, 
the  fact  of  Christ  stands  out  as  the  crowning 
fact  of  all  human  history.  Clearly  this  is 
a  position  which  is  unaffected  by  any  number 
of  Bible  difficulties.  These  may  affect  the 
view  we  take  of  certain  questions  more  or 
less  remotely  connected  with  the  central 
truth,  but  none  of  them,  nor  all  of  them 
together  can  alter  the  great  luminous  fact 
of  Christ,  which  shines  in  the  Bible  as 
the  sun  shines  in  the  heavens.     This  is  the 


igS    GAINS   FROM   REVERENT   CRITICISM 

only  unassailable  foundation.  It  is  so  accord- 
ing to  the  word  of  Christ  Himself,  as  when 
He  said :  **  I  am  the  Way  and  the  Truth 
and  the  Life."  It  is  so  according  to  the 
apostolic  testimony  :  "  Other  foundation  can 
no  man  lay  than  that  which  is  laid,  which 
is  Jesus  Christ "  ;  and  again :  "  To  whom 
coming,  as  unto  a  living  stone,  disallowed 
indeed  of  men,  but  chosen  of  God,  and 
precious,  ye  also,  as  lively  stones,  are  built 
up  a  spiritual  house " — a  passage,  by  the 
way,  which  shows  how  completely  St.  Peter 
understood  our  Saviour  when  He  said : 
"  Upon  this  rock  I  will  build  My  Church.' 
And  this  is  the  position  taken  practically 
by  all  good  Christians,  both  collectively  and 
individually,  for  the  great  congregation 
sings — 

"  The  Church's  one  foundation 
Is  Jesus  Christ  her  Lord  "  ; 

and  the  individual  believer  exults — 

"  On  Christ  the  solid  rock  I  stand, 
All  other  ground  is  sinking  sand." 

It  is  almost  impossible  to  exaggerate  the 
mischief  which  has  been  done,  and  is  now 
done,  by  making  the  shifting  sand  of  human 
theory  the  foundation  on  which  the  Christian 


AN   UNASSAILABLE   FOUNDATION      199 

faith  is  built.  All  the  most  popular  anti- 
Christian  literature  of  the  present  day  as- 
sumes that  Christianity  stands  or  falls  with 
what  is  supposed  to  be  the  orthodox  theory 
of  inspiration.  Take  the  works  of  Samuel 
Laing,  for  example,  which  are  circulated  by 
tens  of  thousands,  and  which,  being  written 
by  a  business  man  of  considerable  culture, 
fair  acquaintance  with  science,  and  a  real 
appreciation  of  poetry  and  art,  appeals  not 
only  to  the  proverbial  man  on  the  street,  but 
to  the  intelligence  of  fairly  educated  men. 
There  is  often  a  sweet  reasonableness  in  his 
way  of  putting  things,  which  captivates  the 
reader,  and  inclines  him  to  accept  his  sug- 
gestions. But  it  will  be  found  that  not  a 
line  of  his  writings  is  valid  against  the  fact 
of  Christ,  and  its  vast  moment.  Here,  for 
example,  is  his  method  of  attack  :  "  What  is 
the  meaning  of  inspiration  ?  It  means  that 
a  certain  book  was  not  written,  as  all  other 
books  in  the  world  have  been  written,  by 
writers  who  were  fallible,  and  whose  state- 
ments and  opinions,  however  admirable  in 
the  main  and  made  in  perfect  good  faith, 
inevitably  reflected  the  views  of  the  age  in 
which  they  lived,  and  contained  matters 
subsequent  ages   found    to   be   obsolete   or 


200    GAINS   FROM   REVERENT   CRITICISM 

erroneous,  but  that  this  particular  book  was 
miraculously  dictated  by  an  infallible  God, 
and,  therefore,  absolutely  and  for  all  time 
true.  But,  as  a  chain  cannot  be  stronger 
than  its  weakest  link,  if  any  one  of  these 
statements  were  proved  not  to  be  true,  the 
theory  of  inspiration  failed."  This  is  con- 
clusive against  the  theory,  but  how  does  it 
affect  the  fact  of  Christ  ?  Is  the  sun  less  a 
sun  since  the  sun-spots  were  discovered  ? 
They  probably  do  not  help  its  shining.  Do 
they  hinder  it  ?     Much  ? 

There  lies  before  me,  as  I  write,  a  list 
of  twenty-six  cheap  reprints  issued  by  the 
Rationalist  Press  Association.  Of  these  the 
majority  are  what  may  be  called  scientific 
treatises,  such  as  Huxley's  lectures  and 
addresses,  and  Darwin's  "  Origin  of  Species," 
not  one  of  which  is  antagonistic  to  the 
modern  view  of  the  divine  inspiration  of 
the  Scriptures ;  and  all  the  rest,  with  the 
possible  exception  of  Renan's  and  Clodd's 
books  on  the  Life  of  Jesus,  are  equally  harm- 
less to  those  who  have  any  faculty  of  spiritual 
appreciation.  The  sale  of  these  books,  we 
are  told,  has  already  reached  close  on  a  mil- 
lion. Think  what  havoc  is  thus  made  on  the 
faith  which  rests  all  on  the  theory  of  verbal 


AN   UNASSAILABLE  FOUNDATION      201 

inspiration,  whereas  to  those  who  remember 
the  distinction  between  the  earthen  vessels 
and  the  treasure  contained  in  them,  there  is 
scarcely  one  of  them  that  would  not  make 
our  position  clearer  and  more  unassailable 
than  ever,  on  the  principle  set  forth  in  Chapter 
XII.  There  are,  no  doubt,  those  now,  as 
always,  who  love  darkness  rather  than  light, 
because  their  deeds  are  evil ;  but  there  are 
multitudes  of  good,  earnest  souls  who  do 
love  the  light,  but  have  been  forced  into 
unbelief  by  the  cruel  demand  that  they  must 
accept  every  word  of  the  Bible  as  coming 
direct  from  God,  or  reject  the  whole.  They 
are  too  conscientious  to  say  they  can  accept 
every  word ;  so  the  only  alternative  left  to 
them  is  to  be  done  with  it  altogether. 

A  theory  of  inspiration  is  perhaps  the 
very  poorest  foundation  which  has  ever  been 
imagined  for  Christian  faith.  It  may  come 
in  very  well  in  the  superstructure.  After 
we  have  accepted  Christ,  we  may  learn  from 
Him  what  to  think  of  the  inspiration  of  the 
Scriptures.  That  is  what  we  have  been 
trying  to  do  throughout  this  little  volume. 
And  though  a  tortoise,  or  even  an  elephant, 
is  a  poor  foundation  for  the  earth  to  stand 
on,  we  may  find  that  even  the  tortoise  will 


202     GAINS   FROM   REVERENT   CRITICISM 

stand  as  securely  as  any  other  creature  on 
the  earth — always  provided  it  can  stand  on 
its  own  feet.  In  any  case,  we  may  rest 
assured  that  if  a  man  truly  believes  in  Christ, 
he  will  not  fail  to  rise  to  a  worthy  faith  in 
the  inspiration  of  the  Scriptures. 

11.  A  Great  Cloud  of  Witnesses. 

So  far  in  this  chapter  we  have  been 
dealing  with  what  is  called  internal  evidence 
— the  appeal  of  Christ  and  His  word  to  the 
soul.  This  is  the  only  sure  foundation  for 
a  stable  faith.  It  is  time  now  to  look  at  the 
external  evidence,  which  may  appeal  even 
to  those  in  whom  the  spiritual  faculty  is  not 
yet  awakened.  As  we  have  already  seen 
(Chapter  VIII.),  mere  external  evidence 
cannot  of  itself  produce  faith,  but  may  arrest 
attention  so  as  to  lead  men  to  lift  up  their 
souls  to  God,  and  give  heed  to  His  message 
of  salvation.  We  may,  in  this  connection, 
recall  again  that  saying  of  our  Lord : 
"  Believe  Me  that  I  am  in  the  Father,  and 
the  Father  in  Me  :  or  else  believe  Me  for 
the  very  works'  sake."  The  first  of  the 
two  appeals  is  to  those  who  have  the 
spiritual  faculty  in  full  exercise,  the  second 
is  to  those  in  whom  it  is  deficient. 


ARRAY  OF  WITNESSES  203 

The  great  bulk  of  the  external  evidence 
is  in  the  library  of  books  which  have  been 
bound  up  together  under  the  general  title 
of  "the  Bible."  Now,  there  is  in  these 
books  a  marvellous  unity  which  justifies 
their  being  bound  up  in  this  way ;  and  in 
fact  this  unity  is  one  of  the  notable  marks 
of  divine  inspiration.  But  it  is  a  very  great 
mistake  in  dealing  with  the  external  evi- 
dence, to  treat  the  Bible  as  if  it  were 
only  one  book,  every  part  standing  or  falling 
with  every  other  part ;  for  thus  not  only  is 
the  weakening  of  one  part  the  weakening 
of  all,  but  the  witness  of  all  is  reduced  to 
the  witness  of  one. 

This  has  been  set  forth  by  the  author 
in  a  previous  volume,  entitled  "  Rock 
vers7is  Sand,"  three  paragraphs  of  which 
he  takes  the  liberty  of  reproducing  in  sub- 
stance. 

We  have  to  deal  here  with  the  extra- 
ordinary perversity  and  unfairness,  so 
common  in  our  day,  of  treating  the  Scrip- 
tures as  if  the  whole  collection  were  only 
one  book.  Of  all  the  unfair  devices  for 
weakening  the  evidences  of  Christianity 
this  is  perhaps  the  very  worst.  And  it  is 
surprising    that   so   many   good    Christians 


204    GAINS   FROM   REVERENT  CRITICISM 

allow  it  and  even  encourage  it  —  some- 
times demand  it.  So  great  is  the  mischief 
arising  from  this,  that  it  would  almost  seem 
a  pity  that,  even  for  convenience,  the  sixty- 
six  or  more  books  which  form  our  Bible  are 
so  constantly  bound  together  in  one  volume. 
For  not  only  is  there  the  unhappy  result 
of  reducing  the  many  witnesses  to  one,  in 
the  minds  of  unthinking  people,  but  also  of 
silencing  and  putting  out  of  court  that  one. 
For  such  unreasoning  suspicion  is  abroad 
about  the  Bible,  that  there  are  multitudes  of 
people  who  would  attach  a  great  deal  more 
importance  to  the  testimony  of  almost  any 
writing  outside  the  Bible,  than  of  any  num- 
ber of  writings  within  It.  Show  them  a  fact 
attested  by  Matthew,  Mark,  Luke,  and  John, 
Paul  and  Peter,  and  they  will  say  :  **  All 
that  is  in  the  Bible ;  give  us  something  out- 
side of  the  Bible  and  we  will  believe  it." 
The  Bible,  in  the  first  place,  is  regarded  by 
them  as  the  work  of  a  single  author ;  and 
in  the  second,  as  that  of  a  prejudiced  author 
— one  who  has  his  own  cause  to  bolster 
up  ;  and  accordingly  a  hundred  confirmations 
within  its  covers  are  not  so  good  as  one  from 
the  outside  would  be. 

Is  this  not  unreasonable  in  the  extreme  ? 


ARRAY  OF  WITNESSES  205 

Let  me  suppose  a  case,  in  order  to  put 
the  monstrous  injustice  in  a  clear  light. 
Suppose  that,  very  soon  after  the  invention 
of  printing,  some  enterprising  editor  had 
collected  all  the  original  materials  of  any 
value  in  regard  to  the  history  of  the  Roman 
Republic  into  one  volume,  which  he  issued 
to  the  world  under  the  title  of  "  The  History 
of  the  Roman  Republic " ;  and  suppose 
further  that  it  became  so  popular  that  it 
was  circulated  first  by  hundreds,  then  by 
thousands,  then  by  hundreds  of  thousands, 
and  finally  by  the  million,  so  that  it  came 
into  almost  everybody's  hands.  But  in 
course  of  time,  after  all  the  world  had  be- 
come accustomed  to  it  in  its  form  of  a 
single  volume,  there  sprang  up  a  fashion  of 
scepticism  on  the  whole  subject,  and  every- 
thing in  the  volume  was  regarded  with 
suspicion ;  and  accordingly  the  whole  his- 
tory of  the  Roman  Republic  was  called  in 
question.  Those  who  believed  it  called 
attention  to  the  many  different  authorities 
who  corroborated  each  other.  "  Here  is 
Livy,  who  writes  about  it  in  Latin.  Here 
is  Dion  Cassius,  who  writes  about  the  same 
thing  in  Greek.  Here  are  speeches  of 
Cicero  that  relate  to  the  same  events.     And 


2o6    GAINS   FROM  REVERENT  CRITICISM 

here  are  poems  of  Horace  that  could  not 
have  been  written  unless  these  facts  were 
so."  But  the  opposite  party  immediately 
silenced  them  by  triumphantly  pointing  out 
that  all  these  different  authorities  were  no 
authorities  at  all.  Why  not  ?  Because  "  it 
is  only  one  book  after  all."  That,  of  course, 
settled  the  question.  In  the  first  place  it 
disposed  of  all  the  separate  witnesses,  of 
Livy,  and  Dion,  and  Cicero,  and  all  the 
rest ;  for  were  they  not  all  one  ?  And  in 
the  second  place  it  disposed  even  of  the 
single  witness  of  the  collective  book,  because 
it  was  the  credibility  of  the  book  itself  which 
was  in  question,  and  therefore,  all  that  was 
in  the  book  must  be  ruled  out  as  the  testi- 
mony of  an  interested  party.  And  so  it  came 
to  pass  that,  from  the  single  unfortunate 
circumstance  of  the  scattered  materials  having 
been  gathered  together  as  bearing  on  the 
one  great  subject,  the  evidence  for  the  his- 
tory of  the  Roman  Republic  was  utterly 
destroyed ! 

Let  us  then  by  all  means  remember,  when 
we  are  dealing  with  the  subject  of  the 
Scriptures,  that  we  are  dealing  not  with 
one  book,  but  with  at  least  sixty-six ;  not 
with  a  single   volume,  but  with  a   library. 


ARRAY  OF  WITNESSES  207 

Remember,  further,  that  these  sixty-six  books 
are  not  h"nks,  but  strands  of  evidence. 
There  is,  indeed,  a  golden  chain  of  sacred 
history  from  Genesis  to  Revelation,  so  that, 
in  a  historical  point  of  view,  many  of  the 
books  of  the  Bible  are  links.  But,  so  far 
as  the  evidences  of  Christianity  are  con- 
cerned, they  are  not  links,  but  strands. 
This  can  be  very  easily  shown.  The 
strength  of  a  chain  is  the  strength  of  its 
weakest  link ;  and  if  a  single  link  gives 
way,  the  whole  is  useless.  Now,  will  any 
one  pretend  to  say  that,  if  it  were  proved 
that  the  Book  of  Esther  had  no  divine 
authority,  we  should  have  to  give  up  the 
Gospel  of  Matthew  .-*  Would  there  be  no 
evidence  for  the  divine  authority  of  Christ  if 
the  Lamentations  of  Jeremiah  had  happened 
to  have  been  lost  ?  Why,  there  would  be 
enough  to  establish  the  divine  authority  of 
Christ,  if  we  had  nothing  more  than  the  four 
evangelists  ;  and  whatever  of  confirmation 
or  elucidation  comes  from  the  many  other 
books,  is  just  so  much  in  addition.  The 
Bible  is  not  a  chain  of  sixty-six  links,  it  is 
a  cable  of  sixty-six  strands. 

This  is  such  an  important  matter  that  it 


2o8    GAINS   FROM   REVERENT   CRITICISM 

may  be  well  to  put  it  in  another  way.  So 
long  as  the  inspiration  of  the  Bible  is  treated 
as  the  foundation  of  faith,  the  Bible  occupies 
the  position  of  a  book  whose  claims  are  to 
be  tried  in  the  court  of  reason.  On  this 
account  it  is  not  allowed  to  speak  for  itself. 
It  occupies  the  position  of  the  panel  at  the 
bar.     Where,  then,  are  the  witnesses  ? 

One  is  reminded  here  of  the  course  of 
procedure  at  a  Presbyterian  synod.  If  a 
complaint  is  made  against  a  presbytery  on 
which  the  synod  must  adjudicate,  the  pres- 
bytery is  for  the  time  disfranchised  ;  not 
one  member  of  it,  however  much  he  knows 
about  the  case,  is  allowed  to  vote,  because 
he  is  an  interested  party.  In  the  same  way, 
Moses  and  Samuel  and  David  and  Isaiah, 
and  Matthew  and  John  and  Paul  are  all  put 
out  of  court ;  for  is  it  not  the  claims  of  the 
Bible  that  are  being  tried,  and  why  should 
any  of  these  people  who  belong  to  the  Bible 
have  any  voice  in  it  ?  It  would  be  quite 
different  if  an  individual  minister  were  being 
tried.  In  that  case,  the  members  of  his 
presbytery  would  each  and  every  one  have 
a  voice,  and,  being  those  who  knew  him 
best,  would  be  the  most  valuable  witnesses 
of  all. 


ARRAY  OF  WITNESSES  209 

This  will  show  the  position  into  which 
those  put  the  Bible  who  make  its  inspiration 
the  fundamental  question.  But  now,  make 
the  fundamental  question,  What  think  ye  of 
Christ  ?  What  divine  Face  looks  out  of 
the  canvas  of  the  book  and  fascinates  you  ? 
Immediately  there  spring  up  a  whole  array 
of  witnesses,  the  very  best,  the  most  com- 
petent, the  very  witnesses  who  can  decide 
the  case. 

But  there  is  a  still  greater  weakness  in 
the  position  taken  by  the  advocates  of  what 
is  called  "Scripture  infallibility."  Not  only 
do  they  allow  the  best  witnesses  to  be  dis- 
credited in  advance  by  belonging  to  the 
party  which  is  on  trial,  but  they  accept  the 
burden  of  proving  them  to  be  not  only 
honest  and  capable,  which  is  right  enough, 
but  infallible,  which  amounts  to  a  weak  and 
foolish  surrender  to  a  most  unjust  demand. 
Did  ever  any  one  hear  of  such  a  demand 
in  any  court  of  justice  in  all  the  world  ?  and 
was  ever  a  defendant  so  weak  as  to  yield 
to  it  ?  to  say  nothing  of  being  so  foolish  as 
to  insist  on  it.  Here  is  a  man  who  has 
his  witness  to  bear  in  a  case  with  which  he 
has  the  best  opportunity  of  being  acquainted. 


210    GAINS  FROM   REVERENT   CRITICISM 

He  is  of  good  character,  of  sound  judgment, 
and  has  no  motive  for  bearing  false  witness. 
But  he  is  not  acquainted  with  geology  ;  he  has 
actually  made  a  mistake  in  history.  "  Put  him 
down.  You  must  get  somebody  who  never 
made  a  mistake,  otherwise  we  cannot  believe  a 
word."  It  does  seem  as  if  our  Lord  Christ  had 
as  little  justice  with  His  accusers  now  as  He 
had  before  the  Sanhedrin  and  Pontius  Pilate. 
Only  lay  aside  this  most  unreasonable 
demand  of  infallibility  on  the  part  of  wit- 
nesses, and  we  are  in  a  position  to  see  that 
the  testimony  to  Christ  as  the  Saviour  of 
mankind  is  simply  overwhelming.  There 
has  been  nothing  like  it  in  the  whole  history 
of  the  world.  We  all  believe  in  what  we 
read  of  Alexander  the  Great  and  Julius 
Csesar,  of  Socrates  and  Seneca,  and  of  many 
other  less  noteworthy  personages  in  ancient 
history.  How  many  witnesses  do  we  require  ? 
In  many  cases  a  single  trustworthy  witness  is 
all  that  is  demanded.  Think  how  much  we 
depend  on  the  solitary  testimony  of  Plutarch ; 
yet  no  one  thinks  it  necessary  to  prove  that 
Plutarch  was  infallible.  We  think  ourselves 
happy  when  we  have  a  twofold  witness,  as 
in  the  case  of  the  life  and  teaching  of 
Socrates.     Is   there   a  single  person  in  all 


ARRAY  OF  WITNESSES  211 

ancient  history  of  whom  we  have  four  bio- 
graphies by  men  of  the  character  and 
trustworthiness  of  Matthew,  Mark,  Luke, 
and  John  ?  Even  if  that  were  all,  it  would 
be  incomparable;  but  think  of  the  number  of 
letters  devoted  to  setting  the  same  august 
personage  before  the  eyes  of  men.  And 
such  biographies  !  And  such  letters  !  It  is 
only  familiarity  with  them  that  makes  it 
possible  for  any  intelligent  person  to  miss 
the  wonder  and  the  glory  of  it. 

And  there  are  not  only  the  contemporaries 
of  Christ,  but  the  marvellous  array  of  wit- 
nesses long  in  advance,  whose  testimony  is 
enshrined  in  the  Old  Testament  Scriptures. 
It  would  greatly  help  to  keep  us  in  the  right 
track  in  this  matter  if  we  would  remember 
the  reason  our  Saviour  gives  for  searching 
these  Scriptures,  namely,  "They  are  they 
that  testify  of  Me."  Consider  how  inde- 
pendent this  makes  us  of  the  innumerable 
difficulties  which  have  been  raised  by 
criticism  in  regard  to  the  Old  Testament. 
**  They  are  they  that  testify  of  Me,"  says 
Christ.  Cannot  Moses  testify  of  Christ 
without  being  as  learned  in  the  learning 
of  the  "  Encyclopaedia  Britannica "  as  he 
was   in    that   of    the    Egyptians  ?      Cannot 


212     GAINS   FROM   REVERENT   CRITICISM 

David  testify  of  Christ,  though,  instead 
of  doing  it  alone  in  the  Book  of  Psalms, 
as  he  was  once  supposed  to  do,  he 
be  surrounded  with  a  whole  company  of 
witnesses  to  share  with  him  the  honour, 
and  change  the  solo  into  the  grandest  chorus 
the  world  has  ever  heard?  Cannot  Isaiah 
testify  of  Christ,  though  the  same  man  may 
not  have  written  the  whole  book  which  now 
bears  his  name  ?  If  his  witness  is  not 
single  and  solitary,  as  we  used  to  think, 
but  the  witness  of  two,  both  of  them 
men  marvellously  gifted,  and  bearing  their 
testimony  with  such  wonderful  harmony  that 
people  generally  believed,  till  lately,  it  was 
the  voice  of  one ;  if  the  solo  be  changed 
into  a  duet,  or  even  into  a  quartette,  what 
are  we  the  worse  ? 

Furthermore,  there  is  this  extraordinary 
phenomenon,  that  not  only  are  there 
witnesses  contemporary,  and  witnesses  in 
advance,  but  a  great  cloud  of  witnesses  ever 
since.  This  is  such  an  extraordinary  cor- 
roboration and  withal  made  so  commonplace 
by  familiarity,  that  it  may  be  well  to  make 
a  fresh  statement  of  it. 

It  will  make  the  point  clearer  if  I  recall 
a  question  put  to  me  by  an  anxious  inquirer 


ARRAY   OF  WITNESSES  213 

who  spoke  of  Christianity — "  Christianity," 
observe,  that  is  the  way  so  many  think  of 
our  faith,  as  behef  in  something  ending  in 
ity  or  ism,  some  system  of  doctrines  com- 
pleted long  ago  and  handed  down  the  ages. 
Well,  this  young  friend,  speaking  of  Chris- 
tianity, said,  "It  seems  so  long  ago,  how  can 
I  know  that  it  has  any  more  truth  in  it  than 
other  religions  ?  " 

One  sees  the  force  of  the  question,  and  can 
sympathize  with  the  difficulty.  If  it  were  a 
question  of  the  rivalry  of  so  many  religions 
— systems  of  thought  which  have  been  elabo- 
rated at  different  periods — then  the  longer 
the  time  since  the  religion  was  promulgated 
the  greater  the  difficulty  in  accepting  it 
as  the  only  true  one ;  for  is  not  the  world 
always  learning,  and  why  not  on  this  subject 
as  well  as  every  other ;  and  if  the  people  of 
that  early  time  were  wrong  as  they  certainly 
were  on  so  many  other  subjects,  why  should 
they  happen  to  be  right  in  this  ?  We  can 
sympathize  with  the  difficulty  thoroughly,  so 
long  as  it  is  a  mere  question  of  a  religion  or 
a  system  of  doctrine  on  the  most  difficult  of 
all  subjects.  But  that  is  not  the  point  at  all. 
It  is  not  a  question  of  a  religion,  it  is  the 
presence  with  us  of  a  heavenly  Friend,  who 


214    GAINS   FROM   REVERENT   CRITICISM 

lived  a  long  time  ago,  it  is  true,  but  who 
claimed  that  He  would  be  with  us  to  the  end 
of  the  ages,  and  as  to  whose  real  presence 
appeal  can  be  made  to  multitudes  in  all 
generations  since  for  the  verification  of  His 
claim. 

Think  what  this  cloud  of  witnesses  means, 
and  how  the  evidence  instead  of  weaken- 
ing as  the  centuries  pass,  keeps  growing 
continually.  To  realize  this,  let  us  go  back 
for  a  moment  to  the  time  when  the  Epistle  to 
the  Hebrews  was  written.  It  was  the  first 
of  the  ages  of  the  Christian  era,  and  the 
number  who  had  believed  in  Christ  was 
very  small  indeed.  The  writer  could 
appeal  to  some  who  finished  their  course : 
"  Remember  them  which  have  the  rule 
over  you,  who  have  spoken  unto  you  the 
word  of  God  ;  whose  faith  follow,  considering 
the  end  of  their  conversation :  Jesus  Christ, 
the  same  yesterday,  to-day,  and  for  ever." 
But  when  he  wanted  a  "  cloud  of  witnesses," 
he  had  to  go  to  the  men  of  faith  under  the 
Old  Covenant,  none  of  whom,  from  the 
nature  of  the  case,  could  be  witnesses  to  the 
living  Christ.  For  that  he  could  appeal  to 
yesterday,  and  assure  them  it  was  the  same 
to-day;  but  as  for  the  ages  to  come — they 


ARRAY  OF   WITNESSES  215 

lay  before  him  and  it  was  easy  enough  (the 
doubter  might  suggest)  for  him  to  assume 
that  it  would  be  the  same  throughout  these 
ages ;  but  how  does  he  know  ?  It  is  quite 
safe  to  prophesy  a  thousand  years  in  advance. 
Nobody  can  prove  you  wrong. 

But  now  many  of  these  ages  which  were 
to  come  lie  behind  us,  and  there  is  not  one 
of  them  that  does  not  bear  its  testimony 
to  the  living  and  reigning  and  saving 
Christ.  The  history  of  the  Church  has 
been  a  very  chequered  one,  but  there  is 
no  time  in  all  its  past  when  there  have 
not  been  new  witnesses.  Think  again  how 
poor  the  early  Church  was  in  this  respect, 
right  on  to  the  end  of  the  apostolic  period. 
Think  of  John  there  in  lonely  Patmos,  the 
cruel  Domitian  on  the  world's  throne,  the 
Church  of  Christ  everywhere  scattered  and 
peeled, — for  aught  that  appeared,  ended, — 
and  he,  the  last  of  the  Twelve,  banished  to  a 
lonely  rock  in  the  sea  to  die  ;  if  there  ever 
was  an  excuse  for  abandoning  all  hope  it  was 
then ;  yet  see  v/ith  what  magnificent  faith 
he  looks  forward  to  the  future,  and  speaks 
of  ten  thousand  times  ten  thousand  and 
thousands  of  thousands,  saying  with  a  loud 
voice,  "  Worthy  is  the  Lamb  that  was  slain 


2i6    GAINS   FROM   REVERENT   CRITICISM 

to  receive  power  and  riches  and  wisdom  and 
strength  and  honour  and  glory  and  blessing." 
But  what  the  lone  seer  descried  in  the  dim 
future,  we  can  all  see  plainly  in  the  historic 
past ;  only  for  thousands  and  ten  thousands 
we  can  put  millions  now,  millions  of  wit- 
nesses to  the  living  Christ,  who  have  testi- 
fied through  life  and  in  death  that  Christ 
Jesus  the  Saviour  of  the  world  was  with 
them,  faithful  and  true,  loving  and  tender, 
an  **  ever  present  help  in  time  of  trouble  "  ; 
the  same  yesterday  and  to-day,  and  age  after 
age  continually. 

It  may  be  here  objected  that  we  have 
taken  no  notice  of  what  to  many  is  the 
chief  difficulty,  namely,  that,  while  wit- 
nesses such  as  Plutarch  and  Livy  are 
readily  accepted  when  they  testify  to  ordin- 
ary facts,  we  at  once  question  them  when 
they  relate  prodigies  ;  whereas  the  witnesses 
we  cite  are  not  testifying  to  an  ordinary 
man  doing  ordinary  things,  but  to  a  very 
extraordinary  man  doing  most  extraordinary 
things. 

To  deal  with  this  fully  would  require  a 
separate  treatise ;  but  it  may  be  pointed 
out  that  the  modern  view  of  the  "  miracles  " 


ARRAY  OF  WITNESSES  217 

which  has  come  in  with  the  advance  of 
criticism  puts  us  in  a  very  strong  position 
here  also.  So  long  as  the  miracles  were 
supposed  to  be  something  appended  to  the 
revelation  to  certify  its  truth,  their  position 
was  precarious ;  but  when  we  realize  that 
they  are  not  so  much  evidences,  as  parts, 
of  the  revelation,  that  they  are  signs  of 
the  kingdom  of  heaven,  that  they  are  not 
portents  or  prodigies,  but  bound  up  naturally 
and  not  incongruously  with  the  character  of 
Christ,  who  accepted  a  reputation  for  them ; 
when  we  realize  that  they  are  not  separable 
excrescences  as  they  are  in  the  pages  of 
uncritical  historians  and  biographers,  but  are 
of  the  very  substance  of  the  testimony  of 
all  the  witnesses ;  when  we  think  that  these 
testimonies  to  a  mighty  Saviour,  originating 
in  the  dimness  of  remote  antiquity,  grew 
clearer  and  clearer  as  the  centuries  advanced 
till  the  full  light  blazed  out  in  the  acclaim 
of  those  who  saw  His  glory ;  and  when  we 
think  that  the  nature  of  the  witness  of  the 
innumerable  multitude  since  is  such  as  to 
confirm,  not  the  ordinary  facts  of  the  life 
on  earth,  but  the  divine  power  of  the 
ever-living  Saviour — when  we  think  of  all 
this,  we  see  that  not  only  the  amount,  but 


2i8    GAINS  FROM  REVERENT  CRITICISM 

the  quality  of  the  testimony,  points  unequi- 
vocally to  One  who  is  not  a  transitory 
mortal,  but  still  lives  and  reigns  and 
saves. 

It  is  easy,  of  course,  for  a  wholly  unspiritual 
mind  to  set  all  this  aside  at  the  dictation  of 
a  preconceived  theory  which  rules  out  the 
supernatural ;  but  wherever  the  spiritual 
faculty  is  not  starved  out  by  disuse  or  per- 
verted by  sin,  the  accumulated  evidence  is, 
as  we  have  said,  simply  overwhelming.  Line 
up  the  procession  once  more,  and  say  if  there 
ever  has  been  anything  approaching  it  in  the 
wide  world.  See  there,  first,  the  long  line  of 
prophets,  every  one  of  them  with  a  light  in 
his  eye  and  a  fire  in  his  soul,  as,  with  a  for- 
ward-pointing finger,  he  says,  "  The  Christ 
is  coming,  the  Christ  of  God  is  coming "  ; 
see  next  the  glorious  company  of  the  apostles 
and  early  Christians,  every  one  of  them  with 
still  more  abundant  tokens  of  heavenly  in- 
spiration, all  uniting  in  the  witness :  "  The 
Christ  is  come,  the  Christ  of  God  is  come  "  ; 
and,  following  them,  an  innumerable  multi- 
tude swelling  on  and  on,  till  it  embraces 
every  kindred  and  tongue  and  people  and 
nation,  and  with  one  accord  they  all  say, 
"  The  Christ  of  God  is  come,  He  is  with  us, 


FRESH  HUMAN   INTEREST  219 

a  living  Saviour,   the  same  yesterday,  and 
to-day,  and  for  ever." 

How  completely  out  of  court  now  is  the 
old  question  whether  the  Bible  rests  on  the 
Church  or  the  Church  on  the  Bible !  What 
is  the  Bible  but  ancient  Church  history  up  to 
the  fulness  of  the  times  when  the  revelation 
was  completed  in  Christ  ?  And  what  is  the 
Church  but  the  continued  succession  of  wit- 
nesses to  the  once  crucified  and  now  exalted 
Redeemer  of  mankind  ?  Neither  Church 
nor  Bible  is  the  foundation.  It  is  Christ 
Himself.  "Other  foundation  can  no  man 
lay  than  that  which  is  laid,  which  is  Jesus 
Christ." 

"  The  Church's  one  foundation 
Is  Jesus  Christ  her  Lord." 

III.  A  Fresh  Human  Interest. 

"The  Bible  is  a  new  book  to  me  now." 
How  often  have  we  heard  this  testimony 
in  the  last  quarter  of  a  century  !  We  have 
always  been  familiar  with  it  on  the  part  of 
those  who  have  passed  from  darkness  into 
light,  who  have  learned  for  the  first  time 
that  it  w^as  in  very  deed  the  word  of  God, 
with  messages  of  forgiveness  and  eternal 
life.     But  the  testimony  we  refer  to  is  not 


220    GAINS   FROM  REVERENT  CRITICISM 

from  newly  converted  people,  but  from  those 
whose  eyes  have  been  opened  to  the  human 
interest  in  the  Bible  ;  not  from  those  who 
for  the  first  time  discover  that  it  is  the  voice 
of  God,  but  from  those  who,  long  accustomed 
to  that  mighty  fact,  have  just  learned  that  it 
is  also  the  word  of  man,  God's  message 
reaching  us  through  the  thoughts  and  emo- 
tions of  men  of  like  passions  with  ourselves. 
The  old  painters  depicted  the  saints  of 
the  Bible  with  golden  aureoles  round  their 
heads.  These  aureoles  have  stayed  on  till 
quite  lately,  and  have  not  helped  us  into 
mutual  acquaintance.  How  should  we  like 
a  man  so  decorated  to  be  a  guest  in  our 
home  ?  How  uncomfortable  for  us,  how  un- 
happy for  him  !  There  is  that,  we  are  glad 
to  admit,  in  many  a  face  which  fairly  an- 
swers to  the  golden  aureole  of  the  painters  ; 
there  is  such  a  thing  as  the  shining  of  a 
human  countenance  with  a  heavenly  light. 
But  though  heavenly,  it  is  not  unearthly — 
that  is  the  point.  Heaven  and  earth  are  not 
contrasts,  were  never  intended  to  be.  An 
aureole  must  not  be  an  appendage  to  a  man  : 
if  it  be  something  wrought  into  his  genuine 
humanity,  it  is  quite  another  thing.  So  with 
the  inspiration  of  the  apostles  and  prophets. 


FRESH  HUMAN   INTEREST  221 

They  are  Spirit-guided,  but  they  are  none 
the  less  men  ;  and  all  they  write  is  of  human 
as  well  as  divine  interest. 

But  is  not  the  humanity  of  the  Bible  so 
obvious  that  it  needs  no  stating  or  empha- 
sizing ?  Not  so.  That  it  is  not  at  all 
obvious  to  many  might  be  inferred,  indeed, 
from  the  very  tone  in  which  it  has  been 
the  almost  universal  habit  to  read  the 
Scriptures,  so  unnatural,  so  sepulchral  some- 
times. And  apart  from  this,  it  is  only  too 
evident  from  the  attitude  many  short-sighted 
Christians  take  as  to  those  investigations 
which  tend  to  put  us  in  touch  with  the  life 
and  times  of  these  holy  men  of  old.  They 
think  the  time  would  be  much  better 
employed  in  devout  meditation  on  the  text 
of  Scripture,  catching  the  divine  meaning 
where  it  is  obvious,  and  spiritualizing  where 
it  is  not.  But  in  this  way  the  human  interest 
is  obscured  or  lost.  It  is,  perhaps,  not  too 
much  to  say  that  to  very  many  good  Christian 
people  in  the  last  generation,  the  personality 
of  the  prophets  of  the  Old  Testament,  and 
even  of  the  apostles  of  the  New,  was 
as  completely  lost  as  was  the  humanity  of 
Jesus  to  the  poet  Dante,  who  took  all  his 
illustrations  of  the  virtues  and  graces  from 


222     GAINS   FROM   REVERENT  CRITICISM 

the  very  scanty  materials  of  the  life  of  the 
Virgin  Mary,  and  not  one  from  the  life  of 
our  Lord.  A  "text"  from  one  book  was 
exactly  the  same  as  a  "  text "  from  another. 
It  could  be  cut  out  from  its  context,  and  set 
alongside  of  a  number  of  others  cut  out  in 
the  same  way,  to  be  used  as  "  proofs  "  of  some 
controverted  doctrine.  For  all  the  use  the 
men's  names  were,  they  might  have  been 
blotted  out  and  the  word  **  God "  put  in 
instead.  There  were  those  even  (are  there 
not  some  survivors  yet  ?)  who  thought  it  a 
merit  to  ignore  the  man  altogether,  as  if  the 
one  fault  of  the  Bible  was  its  unfortunate 
habit  of  telling  what  this  man  or  that  man 
said,  when  it  would  have  been  so  much 
simpler  and  more  satisfactory  if  the  matter 
had  been  cut  short  by  putting  the  whole  from 
beginning  to  end  in  the  name  of  God. 

But  happily  there  have  been  those  who 
have  shown  more  reverence  for  the  Scrip- 
tures as  they  are,  who  have  thought  that 
it  was  not  in  vain  that  our  attention  was 
called  to  the  holy  men  of  old  who  spake 
to  their  fellows  the  word  of  God.  Such 
students  of  Scripture  have  shown  us  how 
well  worth  while  it  is  to  study  these  men, 
to    make    ourselves    acquainted    with     the 


FRESH  HUMAN   INTEREST  223 

circumstances  which  formed  the  occasion  of 
their  utterances,  to  try  to  enter  into  their 
thoughts  and  feehngs,  and  so  to  bring  out 
that  human  side  of  the  divine  word  which 
links  it  to  our  human  lives. 

Just  as  in  the  life  of  Christ  realized  as  the 
life  of  a  man  upon  the  earth,  we  have  God 
brought  near  to  us,  brought  down  into  the 
atmosphere  of  our  thought,  so  that  we  see 
His  face,  and  feel  His  touch,  and  hear  the 
beating  of  His  heart ;  so  in  the  writings  of 
these  holy  men  of  old,  prophets  and  apostles, 
the  word  of  God  comes  to  us — not  as  a 
succession  of  unearthly  voices  out  of  a  far- 
away heaven,  but  as  warm  words  of  life 
from  the  throbbing,  sometimes  sobbing, 
hearts  of  "men  of  like  passions  with  our- 
selves." We  get  them  with  the  warmth 
and  glow  of  earth's  atmosphere  around 
them.  In  all  this  not  only  have  we  the 
Bible  made  more  human,  while  none  the 
less  divine,  but  we  get  rid  of  a  host  of 
difficulties  which  needlessly  troubled  our 
fathers,  and  which  unhappily,  and  still  more 
needlessly,  trouble  some  of  their  children  ; 
for  we  now  see  that  they  are  difficulties 
which  are  inseparable  from  the  human 
medium,  and  do  not  at  all  affect  the  divine 


22  4    GAINS   FROM   REVERENT   CRITICISM 

source   from  which   the  word  of    truth    has 
come. 

It  is  difficult  to  realize  how  far  we  have 
advanced  already  from  the  old  days  of 
mediaeval  darkness,  when  it  was  supposed 
to  be  quite  disrespectful  to  take  the  Bible 
in  its  literal  sense,  especially  those  passages 
which  deal  with  details  of  ordinary  life,  as 
for  example,  in  the  exquisite  story  of  the 
courtship  and  marriage  of  Isaac  and  Re- 
bekah.  Hence  the  invention  of  the  four 
different  senses  of  Scripture.  There  was 
the  literal  sense,  which  was  not  supposed 
to  be  worth  anything  in  comparison  with 
the  three  others,  which  were  the  allegorical, 
the  figurative,  and  the  anagogic.  The  effect 
of  all  this  complication  was  first  that  only 
experts  could  interpret  Scripture  at  all,  and 
next,  and  more  particularly,  that  these  ex- 
perts could  make  it  mean  anything  they 
pleased.  Thus  the  word  of  God  was  made 
null  and  void  by  human  tradition. 

The  Reformation  was  the  great  correc- 
tive to  this  system  of  tampering  with  the 
sincere  milk  of  the  word ;  and  though  there 
is  among  good  people  still  some  tendency 
to  over-spiritualize,  yet  the  literal  interpre- 
tation is  no  longer  set  aside  as  valueless. 


FRESH   HUMAN   INTEREST  225 

But  we  have  not  yet  quite  emerged  from 
the  period  of  selected  texts  and  marked 
Bibles.  We  have  not  a  word  to  say  in 
condemnation  of  this.  We  all  select  texts, 
and  should  we  not  mark  those  passages  in 
our  Bibles  through  which  the  voice  of  God 
has  in  a  special  manner  reached  our  souls  ? 
But  this  is  not  enough.  One  might  be  very 
familiar  with  the  Bible  in  that  fashion,  yet 
enter  very  little  into  the  human  interest 
of  it.  Take  the  prophecy  of  Hosea  as 
an  illustration.  Every  Christian  is  familiar 
with  such  texts  as,  *'  I  will  allure  her  and 
bring  her  into  the  wilderness,  and  speak 
comfortably  unto  her  "  ;  and  again,  "  I  will 
heal  her  back-slidings ;  I  will  love  her 
freely "  ;  but  how  few  comparatively  have 
entered  into  the  pathos  of  the  prophet's  life 
and  the  passion  of  his  human  heart ;  yet 
when  we  do  so,  what  added  pathos  there  is 
in  his  word,  and  what  freshness  and  power 
on  the  reader's  heart ! 

There  is  a  new  vein  of  riches  here 
opened  up  to  us  all  through  the  Scriptures 
by  those  new  studies  which  make  it  possible 
for  us  as  never  before,  not  only  to  realize 
that  these  were  men  of  like  passions  with 
ourselves,  but  to  lay  our  lives  alongside  of 

Q 


226    GAINS  FROM   REVERENT    CRITICISM 

theirs  and  feel  the  very  beating  of  their 
human  hearts.  Even  the  most  exquisite 
gems  of  sacred  Scripture  will  have  an  added 
beauty  when  seen  in  their  setting.  An  old 
reminiscence  comes  in  here  to  illustrate  this, 
a  remembrance  of  the  impression  made  by 
the  reading  of  Dean  Stanley's  introduction 
to  his  exposition  on  i  Corinthians  xiii.  :  "On 
each  side  of  this  chapter  the  tumult  of 
argument  and  remonstrance  still  rages :  but 
within  it  all  is  calm :  the  sentences  move  in 
almost  rhythmical  melody :  the  imagery  un- 
folds itself  in  an  almost  dramatic  propriety  : 
the  language  arranges  itself  with  almost 
rhetorical  accuracy.  We  can  imagine  how 
the  Apostle's  amanuensis  must  have  paused 
to  look  up  in  his  master's  face  at  the  sudden 
change  of  his  style  of  dictation,  and  seen 
his  countenance  lighted  up  as  it  had  been 
the  face  of  an  angel,  as  the  sublime  vision 
of  divine  perfection  passed  before  him." 
And  many  of  us  remember  what  fresh  human 
interest  was  given  to  the  life  and  writings 
of  St.  Paul  by  the  monumental  work  of 
Conybeare  and  Howson,  and  know  how  this 
interest  has  been  deepened  by  the  closer 
study  of  his  inner  life  which  later  writers 
have   made.      These   references   remind  us 


FRESH   HUMAN   INTEREST  227 

that  it  is  a  long  time  since  this  rich  vein 
was  first  opened  up  for  us  in  regard  to  the 
New  Testament  writers;  but  it  is  in  com- 
paratively recent  times  that  the  same  work 
has  become  accessible  for  the  Old  Testa- 
ment, with  the  result  that  it  has  been  rescued 
from  the  neglect  into  which  it  was  in  danger 
of  falling,  and  invested  with  an  interest  which 
is  to  many  almost  like  life  from  the  dead. 

We  have  spoken  of  apostles  and  prophets  ; 
may  we  not  also  refer  to  the  new  light 
which  is  shed  on  the  life  of  our  blessed  Lord 
by  the  realization  of  His  true  humanity  ? 
There  are  those  who  think  it  perilous  to 
draw  special  attention  to  anything  in  our 
Lord's  life  which  suggests  the  limitations 
inseparable  from  human  nature  ;  but  it  must 
not  be  forgotten  that  there  is  corresponding 
peril  in  the  opposite  direction.  There, 
frowning  on  our  left,  encircled  with  mists 
and  beaten  with  tempests  is  the  Scylla  of 
rationalism  which  denies  the  divine ;  but 
is  there  not  on  the  other  side,  less  con- 
spicuous and  therefore  more  deceitful,  the 
Charybdis  of  irrationalism  which  denies  the 
human,  a  whirlpool  which  is  ready  to  enclose 
in  its  treacherous  currents  those  who,  terri- 
fied by  the  frowning  rock,  are  turned  from 


3  28    GAINS  FROM   REVERENT  CRITICISM 

the  onward  course.  What  was  the  heresy 
against  which  the  Apostle  John  uttered  his 
most  solemn  warning  ?  "  Hereby,"  he  says, 
"  know  ye  the  Spirit  of  God :  every  spirit 
that  confesseth  that  Jesus  Christ  is  come  in 
the  flesh  is  of  God ;  every  spirit  that  con- 
fesseth not  that  Jesus  Christ  is  come  in  the 
flesh  is  not  of  God;  and  this  is  that  spirit 
of  antichrist."  The  formidable  heresy  of 
the  time  was  that  of  those  who  represented 
Jesus  Christ  not  as  a  real  man  "compassed 
about  with  infirmity,"  "  tempted  in  all  points 
like  as  we  are,"  but  as  God  walking  through 
life  in  the  outward  semblance  of  a  man. 
And  was  it  not  this  heresy  that  led  to  many 
of  the  corruptions  of  the  Roman  Church, 
notably  the  worship  of  the  Virgin  Mary, 
who  was  introduced  to  supply  the  tender- 
ness of  a  truly  human  mediator,  to  make 
up  for  the  supposed  want  of  it  in  Him  who 
was  no  longer  realized  as  "  the  Man  Christ 
Jesus"  .-*  It  is  true  that  the  opposite  heresy 
is  by  far  the  more  dangerous  now ;  still,  the 
experience  of  the  past  ought  surely  to  show 
us  that  it  is  not  right  or  even  safe  to  ignore 
or  under-value  the  genuine  humanity  of  our 
blessed  Lord. 

To  illustrate    the  importance  of  this,  we 


FRESH   HUMAN   INTEREST  229 

may  refer  to  the  argument  which  is  mainly- 
relied  on  by  those  who  would  set  aside  the 
Cross  of  Christ  from  its  central  position  in 
our  faith.  It  cannot  be  denied  that  all  the 
four  Evangelists  give  it  a  space  out  of  all 
proportion  to  anything  else  in  their  records, 
and  that  the  Apostles  make  it  correspond- 
ingly prominent  in  their  writings.  But  it  is 
said,  Christ  Himself  does  not  agree  with  them. 
He  said  very  little  about  it,  and  in  fact  laid 
the  emphasis  on  quite  other  things,  specially 
on  purity  of  heart  and  righteousness  of  life. 

Now,  the  bare  fact  referred  to  is  indeed 
a  fact;  but  its  significance  is  quite  missed 
by  those  who  do  not  enter  into  the  true 
humanity  of  the  Lord  Jesus.  Let  it  be 
remembered,  to  begin  with,  that  it  is  cha- 
racteristic of  human  nature  at  its  best  to  be 
reticent  as  to  that  which  is  deepest  in  the 
soul ;  and  if  there  is  anything  which  cuts  to 
the  quick,  which  shakes  the  very  foundations 
of  our  being,  it  is  only  under  very  special 
circumstances  that  we  can  be  induced  to 
speak  of  it  at  all.  Now  it  is  quite  evident 
to  the  sympathetic  reader  of  the  life  of  our 
Lord  as  recorded  by  the  four  Evangelists, 
that  the  Cross  was  a  subject  which  cut  to 
the   quick   our    Lord's   sensitive   soul,   and 


230     GAINS   FROM   REVERENT  CRITICISM 

accordingly,  though  ever  in  His  thoughts, 
was  rarely  on  His  lips.  To  look  forward  to 
it  even  was  agony,  and  to  turn  from  it 
was  the  great  temptation  of  His  life — begun 
in  the  wilderness  and  not  finally  overcome 
until  the  crowning  victory  of  Gethsemane. 

Nothing  is  more  clearly  indicated  than  the 
reason  why  He  was  so  late  in  making  it 
the  subject  of  instruction  to  His  disciples. 
It  would  have  been  quite  impossible  for 
them  even  to  beo^in  to  understand  it  until 
they  had  recognized  His  Divine  Sonship. 
We  have  seen  already  how  our  Lord  would 
not  teach  them  this  dogmatically,  but  waited 
till  they  thought  it  out  for  themselves.  But 
as  soon  as  they  gave  evidence  of  seeing  it, 
He  lost  not  a  single  day.  "  From  that  time 
forth  began  Jesus  to  show  unto  His  disciples 
how  that  He  mtist  go  unto  Jerusalem,  and 
suffer  many  things  of  the  elders  and  chief 
priests  and  scribes,  and  be  killed,  and  be 
raised  again  the  third  day."  Even  before 
that,  there  had  been  hints  of  it,  showing  that 
it  was  only  by  resolute  self-suppression  that 
He  refrained  from  plainly  speaking  of  it,  such 
hints  as  we  have  in  His  answer  to  the  question 
about  fasting  (Matthew  ix.  15),  the  reference 
to  the  serpent  in  the  wilderness  (John  iii.  14), 


FRESH  HUMAN   INTEREST  231 

and  the  then  enigmatical  saying :  "  Destroy 
this  temple,  and  in  three  days  I  will  raise  it 
up."  And  though  even  in  the  latter  part  of 
His  ministry  His  reported  words  are  few, 
the  smallness  of  the  number  is  more  than 
made  up  for  by  their  extraordinary  weight, 
and  by  the  deep  emotion  with  which  they 
were  uttered.  Think  of  the  impact  of  that 
little  word  m^ist  in  His  first  plain  utterance 
on  the  subject,  the  implication  of  the  word 
"  ransom "  in  the  phrase  **  And  give  His 
life  a  ransom  for  many,"  and  of  the  word 
"crisis"  when  the  coming  of  the  Greeks 
brought  Him  face  to  face  with  the  fact, 
more  vividly  realized  than  ever  before,  that 
only  by  being  "  lifted  up  "  could  all  men  be 
drawn  unto  Him  :  "Now  is  the  judgment 
{literally  crisis)  of  this  world."  The  whole 
passage  (John  xii.  20-32)  is  most  significant 
in  this  connection,  especially  as  showing 
the  overpowering  emotion  which  the  vivid 
realization  of  the  approaching  sacrifice  stirred 
in  the  Redeemer's  soul.  It  was  an  earlier 
Gethsemane ;  and  indeed  to  those  who  can 
read  between  the  lines,  the  signs  of  such 
profound  emotion  are  apparent  all  through 
the  story,  especially  of  the  last  year  of  the 
Saviour's  life.     As  we  read,  we  realize  that 


232     GAINS   FROM   REVERENT  CRITICISM 

in  the  depths  of  His  soul  there  is  a  volcanic 
fire,  there  continually,  though  it  only  appears 
when  some  rent  is  made  which  lets  it  show 
itself  on  the  surface.  When  Peter  tried  to 
turn  Him  from  the  Cross,  what  means  that 
terrible  agitation  of  soul  which  prompted 
Him  to  cry,  "  Get  thee  behind  Me,  Satan"  ? 
That  too  was  an  earlier  Gethsemane.  Aided 
by  the  beloved  Peter,  the  tempter  seemed 
irresistible.  "  Is  this  an  angel  of  light  with 
a  suggestion  to  which  My  human  nature 
prompts  Me  to  respond  ?  No,  it  is  Satan 
speaking  through  an  angel  of  light,  it  is  the 
old  temptation  of  the  wilderness  coming  in 
insidious  disguise.  Get  thee  behind  Me, 
Satan."  As  we  read  on,  these  jets  of  emotion 
become  more  frequent,  as  when  He  cries, 
"  1  have  a  baptism  to  be  baptized  with,  and 
how  am  I  straitened  till  it  be  accomplished  ! " 
Sometimes  it  is  seen  only  in  His  face  and 
mien,  as  when  it  is  recorded  that  "  He 
steadfastly  set  His  face  to  go  up  to  Jeru- 
salem," and  again,  "  They  were  in  the  way, 
going  up  to  Jerusalem  ;  and  Jesus  was  going 
before  them ;  and  they  were  amazed,  and  they 
that  followed  were  afraid."  Again  we  hear 
Him  say  with  a  very  human  touch  of  bitter- 
ness, "  I  must  walk  to-day  and  to-morrow, 


FRESH  HUMAN   INTEREST  233 

and  the  day  following  :  for  it  cannot  be  that 
a  prophet  perish  out  of  Jerusalem." 

Is  it  not  abundantly  evident  to  any  sym- 
pathetic reader  that  the  Cross  was  always 
in  His  mind,  and  though  His  words  on  it 
were  few,  this  only  shows  the  depth  of 
His  emotion;  and  when  we  enter  into  His 
human  heart,  we  understand  quite  well  that 
it  was  because  it  meant  so  very  much  to 
Him  that  He  could  say  so  very  little,  not 
only  because  it  would  have  broken  His 
disciples'  heart,  but  because  it  was  breaking 
His  own.  And  all  this  impresses  us  the  more 
when  we  find  that  on  the  one  occasion  when 
He  was  relieved  from  both  restraints  He 
spoke  of  nothing  else !  On  the  Mount  of 
Transfiguration,  when  His  disciples  had 
fallen  asleep,  and  He  Himself  was  rapt 
in  the  heavenly  vision  and  converse,  "  He 
spake  (to  Moses  and  Elias — there  was  no 
need  of  reticence  with  them)  of  the  decease 
which  He  should  accomplish  at  Jerusalem." 

Let  this  suffice  as  an  illustration  in  a  large 
way ;  but  many  examples  might  be  given  in 
detail  of  how  the  realization  of  our  Lord's 
humanity  clears  away  even  serious  difficulties. 
Principal  Forsyth  in  his  book  on  **  Religion 
and  Art "  says  :  "  Far  more  than  half  of  the 


234    GAINS   FROM   REVERENT   CRITICISM 

religious  difficulties  which  torment  people  in 
a  day  like  this  are  due  to  the  hard,  inelastic, 
and  unsympathetic  order  of  mind  which  they 
bring  to  bear  upon  subjects  the  most  subtle, 
genial,  and  flexible  of  all."  I  am  sure  this 
is  true,  and  perhaps  I  could  not  get  a  better 
example  of  it  than  one  of  our  Lord's  words 
uttered  in  the  Gethsemane  of  John  xii. ;  and 
it  may  be  a  useful  way  of  dealing  with  it 
to  transcribe  the  answer  which  I  gave  to  a 
friend  who  propounded  it  to  me  as  a  serious 
difficulty.  The  question  was,  "  Can  it  be 
that  the  Lord  Jesus,  who  was  so  rich  and 
tender  in  all  His  human  sympathies,  was 
after  all  so  much  of  a  misanthrope  that  He 
would  deliberately  condemn  the  loving  of 
life,  and  counsel  the  hating  of  it  ?  "  I  repeat 
in  what  follows  the  substance  of  the  answer 
I  gave  my  friend. 

The  erroneous  impression  conveyed  by 
the  words  is  due  to  the  old  practice,  so 
fruitful  in  error,  of  treating  the  Bible  as  a 
mere  collection  of  texts,  any  one  of  which 
may  be  taken  by  itself  and  treated  as  if 
it  stood  alone.  It  is  even  made  a  matter 
of  letters ;  and  there  are  those  who  would 
say — Is  it  not  plainly  written  h-a-t-e,  and 
how  can  it  mean  anything  else  than  hate  ? 


FRESH  HUMAN   INTEREST  235 

How  then  can  one  be  considered  a  Christian 
who  takes  any  pleasure  in  his  life  in  this 
world  ?  Such  persons  continually  forget 
another  set  of  letters  in  the  same  book  for 
which  they  profess  so  much  respect,  which 
set  of  letters,  being  scanned  in  order,  readeth 
thus :  "  The  letter  killeth,  but  the  spirit 
giveth  life."  A  law  document  is  constructed 
to  be  read  according  to  the  letter ;  but  no 
one  who  wanted  lively  reading  would  choose 
that  particular  department  of  literature.  He 
would  prefer  something  that  was  not  quite 
so  precise  and  colourless.  Some  people, 
indeed,  think  that  it  is  an  end  of  all  con- 
troversy to  say,  "There  it  is  in  black  and 
white " ;  but  they  forget  that  there  are  a 
great  many  things  that  will  not  go  into  black 
and  white ;  and  if  nothing  else  than  black 
and  white  is  possible,  as  on  a  printed  page, 
then  there  must  be  some  soul  in  the  person 
reading  it  to  put  the  colour  in  from  the 
suggestions  of  it  which  it  is  possible  to  give. 
Observe,  for  example,  with  what  v/onderful 
success  a  good  etcher  will  give  suggestions 
of  colour  though  he  has  only  black  and 
white  to  do  it  with. 

Now   the  words  "love"  and   "hate,"  as 
found  here,  are  what  we  may  call  touches  of 


236    GAINS  FROM  REVERENT   CRITICISM 

colour.  And  to  see  the  value  of  them  we 
must  look  at  the  surroundings.  We  must 
first  look  at  the  whole  utterance  of  which 
they  form  part ;  and  then,  too,  we  must  put 
ourselves  as  much  as  possible  into  the 
position  of  the  speaker,  that  we  may  look 
at  it  from  his  point  of  view.  We  must,  in  a 
word,  deal  with  the  text,  not  as  consisting  of  so 
many  black  marks  on  a  piece  of  paper,  but  as 
the  warm  utterance  of  a  profoundly  agitated 
soul.  Thus  we  shall  get  above  "  the  letter 
that  killeth,"  to  *'  the  spirit  that  giveth  life." 

Following  this  course,  then,  the  first  thing 
we  observe  is  that  it  is  a  critical  moment  in 
the  Saviour's  histjry.  Perhaps  we  may  best 
get  the  idea  of  the  position  by  thinking  of 
our  Saviour  as  having  just  turned  the  last 
curve  of  the  winding  pathway  of  His  life  on 
earth.  As  He  turned  it,  what  does  He 
see?  What  dark  object  is  that,  straight 
before  Him  there.-*  It  is  the  Cross!  The 
shadow  of  it  has  often  fallen  on  His  path- 
way ;  but  it  is  no  shadow  now — there  it  is, 
straight  before  Him  in  all  its  dread  reality. 
No  wonder  that  He  cries,  "  Father,  save 
Me  from  this  hour." 

It  would  appear  that  our  Saviour  never 
contemplated   the   Cross   without   an   awful 


FRESH  HUMAN  INTEREST  237 

shrinking  from  it.  The  strain  was  more  or 
less  upon  Him  all  the  while,  as  we  have 
already  seen ;  but  there  were  times  when 
from  the  chronic  it  passed  into  the  acute. 
Such  a  time  was  this,  when  the  message 
from  the  Greeks  brought  vividly  to  His 
mind  the  innumerable  multitude  from  every 
kindred,  and  tongue,  and  people,  and  nation, 
to  which  these  would  be  the  prelude ;  and 
the  greatness  of  the  thought  constrained 
Him  by  a  natural  reaction  to  think  of  the 
awful  cost  at  which  alone  that  triumph 
could  be  gained,  realizing  more  vividly 
than  He  had  ever  done  before  that  for  this 
harvest,  as  for  other  harvests,  the  way  must 
be  prepared  by  death.  The  experience  of 
this  hour  then  may  well  be  set  side  by  side 
with  that  of  Gethsemane  itself,  when  three 
times  in  bitter  agony  He  cried,  "  Father,  if 
it  be  possible,  let  this  cup  pass  from  Me." 
It  is  the  same  agony  of  soul  which  is  ex- 
pressed in  the  passage  :  **  Now  is  My  soul 
troubled,  and  what  shall  I  say  ?  Father, 
save  Me  from  this  hour.  But  for  this  cause 
came  I  to  this  hour." 

We  see  then  that  the  Saviour  was  in  the 
midst  of  one  of  the  sorest  conflicts  of 
His  life.     And  these  words  were  spoken  in 


238    GAINS   FROM  REVERENT  CRITICISM 

the  thick  of  it,  when  all  that  was  human  in 
Him — His  whole  life,  as  it  were — rose  up 
in  arms,  and  barred  the  way  to  the  Cross. 
The  temptation  to  turn  out  of  the  con- 
secrated path  was  too  strenuous,  the  moment 
was  too  critical,  to  admit  of  any  half 
measures.  He  must  not  parley  with  such 
an  antagonist.  He  must  treat  him  as  His 
bitterest  foe,  and  hew  a  pathway  through 
him  to  the  Cross.  The  moment  had  come 
when  He  had  to  hate  His  life  in  order  to 
save  it ;  for  what  would  it  all  have  amounted 
to  if  He  had  yielded  now  ?  "  It  was  for  this 
cause  that  I  came  to  this  hour ;  and  hence 
there  is  nothing  for  it  but  to  treat  as  My 
bitterest  enemy  all  desires,  however  natural, 
to  save  My  life  at  the  expense  of  My  life 
work." 

And  now  is  it  not  easy  to  see  the  force  of 
the  colouring  in  the  words  "love"  and 
"hate,"  especially  if  we  remember  the 
Orientalism  of  these  strong  terms  ?  The 
Saviour  has  in  His  mind's  eye  times  of 
sharpest  crisis,  when  a  man  is  brought  face 
to  face  with  his  life  in  this  world  rising 
against  him  as  an  adversary  to  bar  his 
way,  to  close  against  him  the  path  of  duty 
and  devotion — what  then  .-*     If  he  love  his 


FRESH  HUMAN   INTEREST  239 

life,  he  is  lost ;  the  only  hope  is  for  him  to 
hate  it,  to  treat  it  as  his  bitterest  enemy — 
to  run  his  sword  through  and  through  it,  and 
utterly  slay  and  quench  it.  When  we  take 
all  this  into  account,  we  can  see  that  the  way 
in  which  our  Saviour  puts  it  is  not  at  all  too 
strong.  It  is  quite  parallel  with  that  other 
passage  in  which  the  much-loved  Peter  must 
be  hated  in  so  far  as  he  yields  to  Satanic 
suggestion. 

It  would  be  easy,  were  there  space,  to 
give  instances  in  which,  in  the  Prophets 
especially,  passages  which  were  dark  and 
difficult  have  had  a  flood  of  light  thrown 
on  them  by  entering  into  the  emotions  of 
the  writer.  But  I  am  obliged  to  omit  even 
those  illustrations  which  had  been  specially 
prepared,  drawn  from  the  great  Immanuel 
Prophecy  (Isaiah  vii.-ix.  7)  and  from  the 
wild  and  whirling  words  of  Jeremiah  in  such 
a  passage  as  Jeremiah  xx.  7-18  ;  for  the 
limits  assigned  to  this  volume  are  already 
over-passed.  Suffice  it  to  say  that  there 
are  scores  of  passages  like  these  which 
were  stumbling-blocks  before,  and  now  are 
among  the  most  precious  revealings  of  the 
human  soul  under  the  patient  kindness  of 
the  Great  Inspirer. 


240    GAINS   FROM   REVERENT  CRITICISM 

IV.  All  Scripture  Profitable. 

Though  the  old  theory  was  that  the  Bible 
was  all  equally  inspired  **  from  cover  to 
cover,"  as  the  phrase  is,  it  was  only  a  theo- 
retical, not  a  practical,  belief.  Even  the  most 
stalwart  defenders  of  the  theory  have  not 
acted  on  it ;  or,  if  the  attempt  was  made,  as 
in  the  writer's  case  (see  the  Personal  Fore- 
word), it  was  soon  given  over  as  imprac- 
ticable. For,  however  resolutely  one  may 
set  himself  to  go  through  the  whole  Bible 
chapter  by  chapter,  there  are  considerable 
portions  of  it  which  to  the  ordinary  reader 
are  a  hopeless  puzzle.  Possibly  there  may 
not  be  a  single  chapter  in  the  whole 
Bible  in  which  the  devout  soul  will  not 
find  some  light  and  leading,  it  may  be 
sometimes  a  single  verse  gleaming  out  of  the 
surrounding  darkness,  so  that  the  exercise  is 
never  quite  in  vain ;  but  how  much  has  been 
passed  over — in  a  book  like  the  Prophet 
Jeremiah,  for  example — with  scarcely  any 
attempt  to  penetrate  into  the  soul  of  it. 

Even  the  best  of  the  commentators  in  the 
olden  time  scarcely  grappled  with  the  more 
difficult  passages.  A  saintly  genius  like 
Matthew  Henry  could  always  find  something 


ALL  SCRIPTURE  PROFITABLE  241 

highly  spiritual  to  say  on  the  most  unlikely 
passages,  but  it  would  often  be  in  the  way  of 
ingenious  application,  rather  than  of  close 
exposition.  It  was  homiletical  rather  than 
exegetical ;  and  in  many  places  it  was  the 
excellent  word  of  the  good  Matthew  Henry, 
not  the  mind  of  the  Spirit.  And  even 
after  the  era  of  more  careful  study  came  in, 
heralded  by  such  men  as  Dean  Alford  in 
England  and  the  Rev.  Dr.  John  Brown  of 
Edinburgh,  there  was  for  a  long  time  such 
prevalence  of  the  dogmatic  point  of  view, 
and  so  little  attention  paid  to  studying  the 
inner  life  of  the  men,  that  progress  for  a 
time  was  slow.  But  now  that  the  historico- 
critical  method  has  been  not  only  followed 
by  scholars,  but  popularized  by  modern  ex- 
positors, there  are  large  tracts,  of  the  Old 
Testament  especially,  which  have  been  won 
from  the  desert,  so  that  in  many  cases  the 
wilderness  and  the  solitary  place  has  been 
made  to  blossom  as  the  rose,  and  whole 
books  have  been  lighted  up  with  a  wondrous 
lustre. 

There  is  still  the  same  delight  in  the  old 
familiar  passages  ;  but  these  come  in,  even 
in  the  most  difficult  books,  not  as  oases  in 
a  comparative  waste  but  as  lovely  gardens 

R 


242     GAINS  FROM   REVERENT  CRITICISM 

in  the  wide  landscape,  and  we  have  a  joy 
not  only  in  gazing  on  the  flowers  and  rang- 
ing through  the  gardens,  but  in  the  broad 
views  of  the  varied  scenery  of  God's  marvel- 
lous book  of  revelation.  A  journey  through 
the  Bible  has  much  the  same  charm  as  a 
journey  through  the  Holy  Land,  beginning 
from  Mount  Hermon  in  the  north  and 
travelling  to  Mount  Zion  in  the  south ;  for 
is  not  that  grand  epic  of  Creation  with 
which  the  Bible  opens  like  a  great  snow- 
clad  mountain,  rearing  its  head  right  up 
to  heaven,  not  itself  within  the  borders  of 
Israel  any  more  than  the  epic  of  Creation 
is  (for  it  is  not  till  Abraham  that  we  are  in 
the  charmed  circle),  but  from  its  detached 
height  looking  down  upon  all ;  and  when 
we  reach  Mount  Zion  on  the  south,  are  we 
not  come  to  the  sunny  mount  of  God,  not 
bare  like  Hermon  but  with  a  city  upon  it, 
type  and  prophecy  of  the  City  of  God,  the 
Heavenly  Jerusalem?  There  is  not  a  stage 
in  the  journey  that  is  not  full  of  interest; 
and  if  we  were  to  single  out  any  one  feature 
as  specially  arresting,  it  would  be  the  hills. 

Some  people,  in  going  through  the  Bible, 
do  not  notice  the  hills.  They  keep  their 
eyes  for  the  most  part  on  the  ground,  which 


ALL   SCRIPTURE   PROFITABLE         243 

seems  to  them  a  smooth  and  level  plain,  and 
they  find  perhaps  many  a  beautiful  flower 
and  many  a  succulent  herb,  shade  trees,  fruit 
trees,  Elims  of  peace  and  joy ;  but  they  do 
not  notice  the  strength  of  the  hills  and  the 
sweep  of  the  landscape.  They  see  them 
indeed,  but  as  in  a  Chinese  painting  without 
perspective.  That  was  characteristic  of  the 
era  of  texts  and  selected  passages.  But 
now  we  study  whole  books,  and  try  to  get 
the  bearing  of  everything  within  the  range 
of  vision.  And  so  it  comes  to  pass  that 
those  parts  of  the  Bible  which  do  not  mean 
much  as  separate  passages  find  their  place  in 
the  great  scheme  of  the  whole,  and  the  Bible 
becomes  a  glorious  panorama  of  the  unveil- 
ing of  the  revelation  of  God  culminating 
in  Christ  and  finding  its  consummation  in  the 
City  of  God. 

We  are  now  making  less  of  the  micro- 
scopic and  more  of  the  telescopic  method 
of  study.  There  are,  indeed,  passages  of 
Scripture,  and  even  single  words,  which 
will  repay  the  most  careful  use  of  the  micro- 
scope, but  the  larger  view  not  only  brings 
in  all  and  everything,  but  is  generally  much 
more  inspiring.  The  great  subject  of  pro- 
phecy  is   a  good    illustration.       If,    in   the 


244    GAINS  FROM   REVERENT  CRITICISM 

Study  of  prophecy,  we  make  less  now  of 
mere  verbal  coincidences  and  of  minute 
matters  of  detail,  which  to  some  minds  give 
an  impression  of  triviality  out  of  harmony 
with  the  greatness  of  divine  revelation, 
there  is  a  more  vivid  realization  of  the 
grandeur  of  prophecy  as  a  whole,  moving 
on  in  its  majestic  progress  to  its  great  fulfil- 
ment in  the  Christ  of  God  and  His  heavenly 
kingdom. 

In  this  larger  view  of  God's  revelation 
we  are  getting  back  to  the  noble  conception 
of  the  author  of  Psalm  xix.  (how  manifestly 
inspired  he  is  !),  to  whom  it  was  no  mere 
book  or  roll,  assemblage  of  words,  or  ency- 
clopaedia of  texts,  but  something  infinitely 
greater,  which,  scorning  all  comparison  with 
books,  demands  for  a  parallel  nothing  less 
than  the  heavens  which  declare  the  glory 
of  God  and  the  firmament  which  showeth 
His  handiwork  ;  which  challenges  comparison 
not  with  Socrates  or  Plato  but  with  Day 
and  Night ;  and  for  the  central  orb  of  its 
firmament  of  truth  finds  no  image  that  will 
suit  it  but  the  Sun. 


AFTER-WORD 

I  HAVE  fallen  far  short  of  the  ideal  I  set 
before  me  when  I  beg-an  this  little  book. 
I  feel  that  it  far  too  feebly  expresses  the 
strength  of  the  new  position  and  the  value 
of  the  new  light  which  has  been  shed  upon 
Holy  Scripture.  But,  indeed,  no  words  can 
express  the  relief  it  is  to  my  mind  to  find 
myself  in  a  region  where  the  old  Bible 
difficulties  are  quite  irrelevant,  to  be  able 
to  feel  about  the  Bible  as  we  all  feel  about 
the  sun.  There  may  be  spots  on  it  (or  in 
it,  if  that  is  the  better  way  of  putting  it)  ; 
they  tell  us  there  are,  but  that  does  not 
in  the  least  make  it  less  a  sun  to  me.  And 
when  I  hear  of  these  old  difficulties  mar- 
shalled for  the  thousandth  time,  with  the 
expectation  of  destroying  our  faith  in  Christ, 
I  think  of  my  little  grandchild  of  eighteen 
months,  who,  having  been  taught  by  her 
father  to  blow  out  first  a  match  and  then 

a   candle,    made  her   next   attempt   on   the 
245 


246  AFTER-WORD 

orb  of  day,  on  an  afternoon  with  just 
enough  fog  to  make  it  possible  for  her  to 
look  straight  at  its  great  red  ball.  The 
dear  child  tried  it  again  and  again  and 
again. 

And  the  Sun  is  shining  yet ! 


THE    END 


PRINTED   BY   WILLIAM   CLOWBS  AND  SONS,   LIMITED,   LONDON   AND   BKCCLES. 


Date  Due 

m 

ill  1  litfiffiiiilllllll'liiirT 

tfUMKNtSKSBI 

b- 

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3S480.G44 

The  inspiration  and  authority  of  Holy 

Princeton  Theological  Seminary-Speer  Library 


1    1012  00051   9233 


